Of Gods And Monsters
by Magery
Summary: You are a two-bit, first-arc villain miraculously back from the dead. Staying alive will be easy. Staying relevant will be hard.
1. Awakening 1-1

You are Raynare, and you are dead.

It is a fitting name, the 'Power of Destruction' – of your body, there is no longer even ash. You did not feel a thing when Gremory smote you from on high; one moment, you were, the next, you were not. It should have been the final death. You have already rejected Heaven, and Hell killed you. At best, you could have wished for oblivion. So it is quite understandable, you think, to be _absolutely fucking confused_ about the fact you are currently waking up in an alley. Your friends are dead, Azazel could not have defended you even if he'd known—even if he'd cared—and you would know if you'd been resurrected by a Devil. There was nobody and nothing to save you.

And yet, here you are, discarded against a grimy wall in the gloom like the trash you've always been told you are. You shove yourself to your feet out of pride if nothing else, your body uncoiling with the lithe arrogance that marks you as something more than human. Specifically, something more than _the_ human who stumbles into the alley right as you are flexing your wings. Short, squat, and distinctly Japanese, you can smell him from here, and it's not entirely because your senses are far superior to any mewling little mortal. You wouldn't be surprised if the last time he bathed was before you took your first breath.

He, on the other hand, looks quite surprised at the sight of a woman with wings. It even drowns out the lust you imagine your form must inspire – you are, after all, the most beautiful thing he will ever see. And possibly the last; you shouldn't let him leave knowing what you are, and even if there are other, easier methods, you've just woken up from impotence and humiliating disgrace.

There's nothing like a little murder to make a girl feel better about herself.

In the end, though, you decide against it. You have better solutions at hand.

That problem taken care of, you stride out of the alley, pulsing its filth from your form with a burst of your Light as you seal your wings beneath your skin. The buildings around you are vaguely familiar – you remember passing them once or twice on your way to and from the church. Whoever or whatever dumped you did so on the opposite side of Kuoh to the Devils, for which you are briefly and silently thankful for. They've already killed you once, and you'd rather they not do so again.

Though you wouldn't mind a rematch against that brat-turned-Red Dragon Emperor. He only beat you because he had a fucking _Longinus_ and you never took him seriously until it was too late. Next time you'll just stab a spear into his brain in the first five seconds of the fight. Let him Boost out of _that_.

(You are vaguely aware that you are suppressing an existential crisis with scorn and sarcasm, but what else is new?)

If you recall correctly, there are a couple of restaurants nearby. And hotels. You need a place to stay, and you suspect your stomach is five minutes away from performing its best impression of a chainsaw. You don't need sleep—you just want privacy—so you're thinking food before shelter. Mostly because you're really fucking hungry. Humans, for all their flaws and general worthlessness, are actually pretty good when it comes to cooking. You'd like to enjoy the first meal of your new life, and while you've never been that fond of Japanese cuisine, there are plenty of foreign restaurants in Japan.

As far as you can remember, there's an Italian restaurant somewhere in the vicinity. You've always enjoyed Italian – in part because the idea of the apoplectic fits the Church and their lackeys would descend into at the idea of a Fallen Angel sitting down to a nice meal somewhere in Rome has always amused you. Given the Vatican's proximity, it would likely be a _final_ meal, but you'll take what humour you can get at times like this. You figure you'll decide which hotel to pass the rest of the night at after you've eaten. None of them will be terrible, and you'd be an idiot to stay somewhere particularly fancy: the higher-class the establishment, the harder it is to turn up without warning and book a room. The mortal tendency for bureaucracy has always amazed and disgusted you in equal measure.

Point is, it's time to head off. There might not be any money in your pockets (in part because your outfit doesn't have any pockets) but that's not a problem. Mittelt might have put your sorcery to shame, but that didn't stop you from stealing a trick here and there over the years.

Your strategy decided, you turn down the next street, cracking a theatrical stretch that flexes your arms, arches your back, and causes a traffic accident in the process.

 _Still got it_.

* * *

 **A/N:** **If anyone was wondering where I've been, look no further. This is the first chapter of _Of Gods And Monsters_ , a Raynare quest I've been running over on the Sufficient Velocity forum instead of working on _Sidereal Sunset_. I've decided to cross-post the story updates only—without the votes or their results—over here, because I've been told it's fluid enough to work that way (we shall see), and because I am an attention whore. **

**Mostly because I'm an attention whore.**

 **I'll be posting at least two chapters a day until I catch up to the backlog, at which point I'll copy over updates shortly after I post them to the thread. If you want to catch up faster than I will, the thread is waiting.**

 **Friendly warning: if you're read _Sidereal Sunset_ , this Raynare is going to seem fairly similar at times, because the character creation votes ending up picking literally every option inspired by the same. **


	2. Awakening 1-2

As you wander, you wonder. It was so, so tempting to just ignore the man who stumbled across you; to walk right past him and let him bask in your glory. Certainly, the tale would have made its way back to the Devils eventually; every supernatural race is always on watch for those who might considering breaking the Masquerade. But what's the worst they could do to you – kill you?

Been there, done that, didn't even leave behind enough to make a t-shirt.

Rationality prevailed, however, and so you left him lying in the alley dreaming about going on a massive bender and turning into a cockroach. Maybe he'll even wake up thinking he's still one, though you're not sure he'd be able to tell the difference. Point is, he won't remember you, and he certainly won't remember walking to the alley.

Better that than killing him. Humans are annoyingly thorough about investigating murder, and it'd take far too much time and effort to be bothered with covering it up. Assassinating Hyoudou—however temporary it turned out to be—was a rush job; you'd had to decide between planning the infiltration or concealing the result, and in a town populated by two of the Maou's little sisters, you obviously chose the former.

For all that Gremory claimed to have known you were there all along, that didn't stop you from waltzing up to a Sacred Gear wielder from her own school, dragging him across the town, and stabbing a spear through his gut.

Crossing one last street, you arrive outside the restaurant. Thankfully, it's still open, though there aren't many people around at this time of night. A waitress directs you to a table, speaking hesitantly in English at the sight of your face until you reply in flawless Japanese.

She shouldn't be so surprised. You were old before her language existed.

You help yourself to garlic bread, a pasta nothing like the dish it's claiming to be but that's nice regardless, and the only gift from Heaven you've ever appreciated: tiramisu. (What? It came from Italy, home of the Church. Of course Heaven had something to do with it). For a Italian restaurant entirely staffed by Japanese people, maybe one of whom has ever been to Italy in the first place, it's not bad. Mittelt might have even called it passable.

The name doesn't send a stab of pain through your heart. Of course it doesn't. You're Raynare, back from the dead. You don't have _time_ to care.

You stand, abruptly, and walk to the counter. The atmosphere—or lack of it—was getting irritating anyway. Time to blow this joint.

The same waitress from earlier tallies up your order, which comes to ¥2650. Without looking, you reach into a pocket and pull out the perfect amount, settling it on the counter and turning to leave. You can feel her mild amazement; it's not like you've pulled a rabbit from behind your ear, but it's still enough to impress someone so small-minded. You don't bother hiding your smirk. Humans are so blind. The money is as real as Hyoudou's chances to get the harem he babbled on about when you were researching how best to approach him. An illusion so simple it wasn't even worth the effort to make sure it'd persist longer than a couple of minutes.

You step outside into the chill night air; it's not snowing, but you expect it might tomorrow. Kalawarner always hated winter. You can hear her complaining in your head – the rant was impressive once, but hearing it once a year for a full millennium wore away the luster.

You let the memory play regardless.

According to the city map and tourist's guide you memorised when you first arrived, there should be a reasonable hotel a couple of streets to the north. Glancing at the stars to orient yourself, you turn and start to walk toward it. There aren't many people out this late, but that doesn't matter: with your magic, you don't need to steal someone's ID or have one freshly made by Dohnaseek's old buddies. Not that you'd know where to find them in the first place.

Soon enough, you're there. The building is short and quaint, like a midget dressed as a Victorian noblewoman. That was a strange centennial. Fortunately, you don't have to worry about Hamziel ever inviting himself along again. Unfortunately, that's because even if you haven't been posthumously declared rogue from the Grigori, the entire world thinks you're dead.

When the doors fly open before you, the bored-looking receptionist doesn't glance up at first. That changes when you lean against the counter, resting your elbows against the wood – you're taller than the average Japanese, and so it's at _just_ the right height to emphasise certain... attributes of yours.

 _That_ gets her attention. Out of jealousy and awe, rather than lust (a pity, you could have had some fun with that), but that's still nothing less than what your body deserves.

"I'd like to book a room for the next few nights," you say. "Got any vacancies?"

She looks you up and down briefly, and if you were anywhere else, you'd expect her to say something about this not being a love-hotel, or the local equivalent. But this is Japan, where politeness is a national sport, and so she starts tapping away at her computer instead.

"Yes, ma'am," she says. "There is one available on the first floor, and one on the third."

"Do either of them have windows?"

"Both."

"Then I'll take the one on the third."

You lived in Heaven, the highest place in the world, for centuries. Banished or not, some instincts are hard to shake.

"Very well, ma'am. May I see your identification?"

You pull said identification from a pocket, and offer it up – or, at least, that's what it would look like to her and anyone watching through the security cameras.

"Thank you," she says, and repeats it when you pass over the cash to pay for the room. You can hear the raised eyebrow—a woman who looks like you, arriving late at night with no luggage and paying only in cash—but she doesn't comment, and you're too busy laughing inside to care about the fact you can still read the judgement in the corners of her artificial smile.

As if anyone who'd be willing to be seen in a hotel as ordinary as this could afford _you_.

You collect the keycard and head to the stairs, ignoring the lift. The flights aren't particularly steep, and the steps are shallow, so you take them two at a time. The steps, that is, not the flights. You're not going to pull your wings out in the middle of a hotel after inducing a psychedelic hallucination in the last person who saw them.

Before you get to your room, though, you should probably figure out what you're going to do when you get there. Or, more precisely, how you're going to approach the tiny little problem of figuring out _how the fuck you're still alive_.


	3. Awakening 1-3

You swipe the keycard against the door, and it clicks open, revealing the modestly-furnished hotel room ostensibly belonging to one Raven Black, British tourist. One day, you'll get Dohnaseek back for that. The thought comes before you can stop it, and you shove the door closed harder than necessary. The hinges rattle, and the wood creaks in protest, but you can't find it in yourself to care.

Thankfully the room has a bed, instead of a stupid piddly futon. It's not like you plan on sleeping, but you do need somewhere comfortable to lie down. You have a soul to study, and that means you need peace and quiet. Something you should probably ensure before you get down to business, so to speak.

You scan the room: no cameras, as you expected. Good. You run the nail of your little finger across your other palm, directly across your sun line—fuck the idiots who called it the Apollo line, you're older than he is—pressing down and channeling the slightest quantum of Light until it's sharp enough to break your skin. Ignoring the sting of pain through the ease of long practice, you trace the cut again and again until a streak of liquid starlight stains your hand.

The window, the two opposing walls, and the door all receive their own, bloody decoration: a glyph of privacy, painted in blood drawn from a wound you carved in your own fame and success. The symbolism is crude, the materials more so, but you're not working with Azazel's ritual lab or even a journeyman's sack of reagents. You etch a fifth, identical glyph into the centre of the room—etch, because your blood sizzles and bubbles against the carpet, just as it did against the wood and the glass—and call your Light into your hand.

Pressing it down against the glyph, you feed your Light into the wardspace, and sing it to life. It's a quiet song, this one – all subtle movements and soft, trembling strings. A symphony of silence and secrets. It fades away with the glyphs themselves when you're done; soon the only sign of your sorcery is the scar across your palm. It'll heal, in time. Too much time. If only those fucking brats hadn't screwed you over. You could have had a Sacred Gear – a Sacred Gear of _unrestricted healing_. The Grigori would have welcomed you with open arms. You'd have been lauded as a saviour of your race. Azazel would have smiled at you. Maybe even Shemhazai would have looked up from fawning over his Devil bitch of a wife. And you certainly wouldn't be in this shitty little room looking at a cut that hasn't even sealed yet.

Dismissing your thoughts, you walk over to the bed, and are certainly far too dignified to simply flop down upon it. Rolling over until you're staring at the ceiling, you lift your back off the covers with nothing but the strength of your core, and let your wings out. They materialise with a soft thump, almost indistinguishable from the sound you made when you landed on the bed. Aah. That's more like it. Crossing your legs under you in a set of motions that would have been very interesting to anyone if they'd happened to be watching, you breathe in, and out. In, and out. Your Light pulses to the rhythm, lapping up against the edges of your body like waves against the shore. Each beat of your heart is slower than the last, and every inhale tastes of starlight and spring.

You close your eyes, and hear infinity.

Soulgazing is _strange_.

To see exactly what you are has driven lesser men mad. But you were once an Angel, and, Fallen or not, you were not born. You were made. God spun you from light and Light, and the body you're wearing is one you built only when it became necessary.

(In hindsight, some people might call that a mistake. Having an earthly form meant you got to know earthly pleasures, and such things were not for Angels. But of everything you regret, your Fall is not one of them. Better to die free than live a slave – even if you'd much prefer not to die at all. Again).

You do not fear to know the shape of your soul, no matter how long it's been since you last bothered to look.

You turn your gaze inward, and start in surprise, throwing yourself out of your trance.

That… was _not_ your soul.

No. That's wrong. It was, it's just… you need to look again.

It takes almost an hour before you can calm yourself enough to begin a second soulgaze, but eventually you fall back into the gaps between your bones and blood. The Light of your soul is warm against your skin, and far, far too bright. You are a Fallen Angel – your Light is dim, shrouded in sin. That sin is still there, but now it's coiling around your core like smoke, or mist, not as a deep, choking blackness strangling everything you used to be.

That would be concerning in and of itself, because you sure as Hell haven't done anything to try and redeem yourself lately – but that's not even the problem. It's not that your sin is less, it's that your Light is _more_. Not enough to match a four-wing, but still.

You are a Fallen Angel, and God is dead.

There are few impossibilities in a universe governed by a dreamer – _the_ Dreamer.

This is one of them.

You… well, quite frankly, you have no idea what's going on. It's beyond obvious it's got _something_ to do with how you're still alive, but you don't have the time or resources to study this—study yourself—properly. You know of a couple of rituals that would help; perhaps ironically the Sacred Gear extraction ritual is one of them. It has to reach the soul in order to pull out the Sacred Gear, and you _think_ you might be able to modify it to do the first without the second. But all your tools are back at the abandoned church, and that sort of ritual is loud.

If you want to do this properly—and you do, this is your fucking _soul_ you're talking about—you're going to need a workshop. Somewhere secret. Somewhere safe. Certainly not a shitty hotel room sealed with a third-rate privacy ward and nothing else.

Come to think of it, you're probably going to want to stop walking around wearing the face of a dead woman, too.


	4. Awakening 1-4

The answer is obvious. You have no contacts, no resources, and nowhere to hide – you need to solve as many of those problems as you can simultaneously if you want to get anywhere. The abandoned church was your base, and it has everything you need except safety. Dohnaseek's phone—and what's on it—will be a Godsend for surviving in this country or even leaving it entirely, and that's not counting Mittelt's library (or Kalawarner's wardrobe).

The biggest prize is, of course, your ritual supplies. One of the fundamental rules of sorcery is being prepared to get it wrong the first time (and the second, and the third), so you made sure you were ready to repeat the Sacred Gear extraction ritual as often as it proved necessary. If the ideas flitting inside your head bear fruit, you're glad you did – because you're probably going to need to.

First, though, you're going to have to actually get there. That means slipping through the city without stumbling on a Devil, their wards, their familiars, any of the rogue exorcists who might have escaped that disastrous night, or even a particularly perceptive hedge witch. You're pretty sure the Devils won't be keeping a _close_ eye on the church, but a lack of caution has already fucked you over once, and you're not going to repeat the mistake that killed you.

Thus, step one: change your face. You'll need to wipe the mind of the receptionist, as well as find out where they store the security camera footage and doctor it. There's likely a security guard of some description who watches them, but they'll be wherever the feed is, so you can just kill two birds with one stone. Nobody else saw you in this place; there were a couple of passers-by on the way here, and the people at the restaurant, but if the Devils find you through _that_ you might as well accept that the universe hates you.

What do you look like?

A brief twist of Light, and your form shifts and blurs until you look nothing like yourself – and, more importantly, just the way the 'real' version of Raven Black's passport says you should. Your body is as pale as moonlight, but your hair could have been woven from obsidian. Your eyes are the green of freshly-cut grass, and a racetrack would be jealous of your curves. Then you layer that with another, more temporary disguise; no point rocking up to the abandoned church only to be recognised on the way because the Devils actually _did_ raid it and thereby have your identification on-hand.

Convoluted, perhaps, but there's a second advantage in multiple layers of illusion – if you stumble through a ward that breaks one, you'll have another underneath. You can't maintain more than that at the moment, unfortunately, or else you would.

You step out of your room, glancing up at the hallway camera. Whoever's watching will probably be _quite_ confused to see a different woman step out than went in. Thankfully, you don't expect them to be particularly attentive – your soulgazes took about as long as you thought they would, and a glance out the window tells you the sun is going to rise in the next hour or so.

First, to the reception. The hotel isn't big or busy enough to have multiple receptionists operating on shift, so it should be the same woman as before. You can wipe her mind and find out where the security centre is at the same time, which is rather convenient. Strolling down the stairs, your confidence is rewarded – it's the same girl on the desk, even more bored now than she was hours earlier. Though perhaps that's tiredness, given she's either stayed there the whole time, or gone to bed and woken up not long ago.

This time, you don't bother to greet her. There's no need to fake politeness, given what you're about to do. You simply walk up, rap on the desk, and when she looks up from the novel she's reading, you slip into her mind through her eyes. It's a dull, boring place, like all mortal minds; there is no soundless strum of sorcery, no deep, echoing _other_ like the one time you felt Azazel's telepathy. Only the barely-there whisper of the Light in every human soul.

You trace well-worn paths through her thoughts; you've done this a thousand times before, and you'll do it a thousand more. Her memories of you have a… resonance, of sorts, and you reach out to them with questing, ethereal fingers. You are not always this gentle, but sorcery leaves traces, and you don't want yours to be found that easily.

With a subtlety three thousand years in the making, you unpick and restitch each memory until she remembers Raven Black rather than Raynare. The work is careful, but not slow – this is nothing new, and nothing difficult. Just as easy is the light dose of hypnosis that has her spilling the location of the security desk. It's right behind her desk, the door tucked around the side.

You lift yourself out of her mind slowly, wiping the traces of your immediate presence as you go. A final whisper of Light sends her drifting off to sleep, and you don't bother to catch her as she slumps face-first into her book with a soft thud. Now for the cameras.

Strolling around the desk, the door to the security room opens for you, the surprisingly-non-stereotypical young, thin security guard looking at you with some confusion. He must have seen what happened to the receptionist – but he has no idea what he's dealing with.

His glance brushes straight past your face to take in the rest of your body; it lingers long enough that you have to wrench his jaw up with your fingers to make sure he's looking in your eyes. The attention is not so much flattering as it is deserved, but you don't have time to indulge his hormones right now. You have work to do.

There is very little difference between his mind and the receptionist's, and very little difference in what you do to it either. Soon enough, he doesn't remember anyone but Raven Black, and then he's falling into your arms as your Light sings him to sleep. You catch him out of necessity rather than care, and place him on the floor. He doesn't need the chair, and you prefer to work in comfort. It takes but a moment to access the security feeds, and soon you're tapping away at the keys, bringing up the last twelve hours. The set-up is simplistic, thankfully, and it's just fed into an ordinary computer – one with an internet connection that the guard has apparently been using to play a game of some description, if your guess about the minimised icon is correct. How convenient.

It also has a clock, which reminds you that you don't actually know how long it's been since you died. The time—4:53 am—is not important, but the _date_ is, and, apparently, it's two days since you tried to take Twilight Healing. Backtracking how long you've been up and about, that means you woke up at least a full day after Gremory killed you.

That's… interesting. Every method of reincarnation you've heard of is instant. But that sort of sorcery has never been your forte; another reason you need Mittelt's library.

Shelving it as yet one more problem for later, you open up the computer's standard video-editing software and get to work. It's nothing fancy, just looping the footage for the short time you were visible on the cameras so it looks like there's nobody there. More suspicious than simply wiping it if it's discovered – but conversely less likely to _be_ discovered in the first place. You're finished in half an hour, including a quick bit of work to make sure the cameras will have a slight malfunction until after you've left.

Lifting the security guard off the floor, you dump him in his chair, and make sure he's leaning across his keyboard like he nodded off naturally. Time to go.

As you leave the hotel, you start to plan.


	5. Awakening 1-5

Slow and steady wins the race. You rushed into things before, and, as much as the thought feels repetitive, it killed you. Night is when Devils are strongest, and even if it's almost morning, there's no point risking it. In fact, you're going to give yourself _plenty_ of time – according to the computer back at the hotel, today is a Wednesday, and that means the Devils will be at school.

You don't know why they bother going to a human school. It seems demeaning even for a Devil. Enticing them toward sin is one thing, but you don't need to spend eight hours of your life surrounded by the dregs and upstart thieves of this world to do that. Sometimes all it takes is a look. But you suppose it doesn't really matter: whatever their reasons, they only help to aid you in your cause, so you might as well thank them for their idiocy and move on.

Very few people are wandering the streets at this hour, and that's fine by you. Detection spells are by no means your speciality, so if a whole set of variables want to eliminate themselves without any effort on your behalf, you'll take it. Not that you expect your relative lack of skill to matter all that much: you are dealing with a bunch of teenagers who all seem to favour force over finesse.

If they'd been any good at warding, you'd never have made it within fifty feet of Hyoudou. Hell, you might not have even made it within fifty feet of the _city_ without being confronted with a request to explain your presence. A silent, shadow war is a war nonetheless, and no Fallen are welcome in Devil territory. Gremory said she didn't want to risk killing you out of hand until she'd confirmed how closely you were tied to Azazel, but that doesn't mean she couldn't have made your life difficult.

Well. More difficult than resurrecting Hyoudou, slaughtering all your friends, and rendering you unto dust.

Point is, you're going to be cautious, but you expect that caution to be for nothing. It is with that thought in mind that you stop a couple of blocks away from the church, and duck into an alley that reminds you a little of the one you woke up in. You've got hours to kill, and a lot of searching to kill them with. First, though, you have something a little simpler planned.

Concealing yourself in the shadows at the end of the alley, you close your eyes and start to listen. There is Light in all the things God made, from the meanest stone to the mightiest Angel, and you can hear the way it sings. It's no senjutsu, and too slow and unreliable to be of use in combat, but perfect for a situation like this, when you have plenty of time and no desire to be louder than you must.

You can hear the whisper of mortal souls as they brush past one another, the old, lonely echo of worship that is the abandoned church, and most importantly _not_ the discordant, jarring screech that would mark the world rejecting the anathemic taint of a Devil. So at least they're not physically present – unless they're in some sort of disguise your senses can't pierce.

Somehow, you doubt that. They didn't seem like fans of subtlety.

Still, that doesn't stop you from straining yourself just that little harder on the off-chance the fact you have more Light than you should translates to some level of increased sensitivity to it – but you don't find anything you shouldn't. Looks like it's time to move on to actual sorcery. Power pools in your hands, and you scratch out a series of symbols on the ground in a perfect circle. You don't have chalk or candles, but you don't need those – only a couple of sticks plucked from the floor of the alley and the blood of the mouse trying to scurry past you.

You snap its neck with a flick of your wrist, and carve a wound in its side with a Light-sharpened finger. The blood sprinkles out, across the circle, and you start to chant. Each word makes the air shudder in protest – some stick to your tongue until you're almost coughing them out, and others make no sound entirely. The sticks catch alight, but the flame is white and frost spreads around wherever it touches.

 **Mᴏʀᴛᴀʟ, ᴅᴏ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡɪsʜ ᴛᴏ ᴅɪᴇ?**

The words are not so much spoken as felt.

You sigh, and tear the illusions asunder with the slightest flex of will. Based on its expression, the pixie in the centre of your summoning circle has just realised it may have made a terrible mistake. It glances up at you in fear – another mistake. Your mind shatters through its pathetic mental barriers like a fist through glass. Its thoughts are even quieter than a human's, and devoid of Light, so it takes no effort at all to bend the entire thing to your will.

Summoning is not something you do very often, mostly because you never need to, but you're far too old not to have picked up simple things like this here and there. Especially not in a discipline that relies so heavily on rituals. Pixies are tiny—this one is outmassed and outsized by your finger—and the only things less dangerous than their magic are their combat skills. But they _are_ very hard to spot with sight or sorcery, and the plane they—and the rest of the Aos Sí—live on is one rich in magic, so they're naturally more sensitive to it than even you are.

No: you'd take even a third-rate priest over a pixie in a fight, but they are perfect for scouting, and that's what you need here. You sear your commands into its mind, and scuff over the edge of the summoning circle with your foot. The pixie immediately launches itself up toward the sky, and is soon flitting its way toward the church. Not in a straight line, though – you're not quite _that_ stupid. It'll scout in from the west, the opposite direction to the abandoned factory, and report back to you on whether it can find anything in your way.

That, of course, leaves you simply to sit here and wait.

...you should have brought a book.

You while away the hours—you told the pixie to be thorough, and it's searching an area incomprehensibly larger than it is—thinking: about your past, about your future, and all the things you don't care to name. It's the first moment of silence you've had since you died, and you don't dedicate it to your friends, because that's pathetic and weak and you don't care.

You don't.

You wipe a hand against your cheek, and focus on the low hum of Light in the back of your mind that tells you your pixie is still alive. It's closer now, only half a block away, and it isn't too much later that it's hovering in front of you. A quick plunge into its mind later, and you have your report: nothing.

The abandoned church is exactly that. Abandoned. The only traces of sorcery the pixie could find are readily identifiable as the last, fading remnants of the extraction ritual. Glancing toward the sun, you see it's high in the sky: time to go. You'll keep your senses open for anything the pixie might have missed, but honestly at this stage if you stumble on something it was too well-disguised for you to find in the first place.

It's the work of moments to wipe the pixie's mind so it doesn't remember even being summoned, let alone what you forced it to do, and then you cut the flow of power anchoring it to this world. It disappears with a soft crack, and you head out of the alley with quick, almost eager steps. You slip through the streets toward the church, and soon enough you're approaching it from behind, where the the secondary trap-door opens to.

(Of course it has a secret escape route. It's a church, and that means it's a target for not only the Fallen, but also the Devils, particularly aggressive Shinto, certain factions of youkai, and far more besides. A quick exit in the face of impending violence is always useful).

You can't feel any wards nearby, nor smell any mundane explosives, and a quick pulse of Light doesn't trigger anything, so you slip the trapdoor open and drop down the ladder. The generator Dohnaseek set up must have run out of fuel, because the whole place is dark enough to shame the night, but that's a problem easily solved with a snap of your fingers to summon a series of magelights. They circle you like tiny stars as you walk through the empty halls, on your way to your first stop: Mittelt's room.

As much as you need your ritual supplies, you can't carry them away on your own, let alone everything else you intend to bring. Thankfully, Mittelt was—amongst other things—obsessed with seal magic, and you're pretty sure you _might_ be able to fit an entire house in her suitcase. She… doesn't need it anymore, and hopefully most of the traps she inevitably set have weakened with her death.

The door opens without resistance when you push against the frame, revealing the sparkling, glittery abomination that is Mittelt's taste in interior decoration. You ignore the colour of the walls as best you can, and simply refuse to look at the bed, instead heading to the corner against which her suitcase rests. The locks click open under your touch, and you only have to silence an alarm and shatter a stasis field before it can fully trigger to get access to its cavernous depths. The display of trust in such an uncomplicated set of protections is oddly touching.

Well, while you're here, you might as well get the rest of what you came for. Most of Mittelt's collection of books are still inside the suitcase, but you grab a few more titles from around the room—the first two volumes of _The Books of Sorrow_ , and the _Morellonomicon_ —and return them to where they belong.

Your task there done, you head to Kalawarner's room. The posters are as lewd as you expected, as are most of the dresses she has hanging in the closet, but eventually you pack everything inside it, and then Kalawarner's own suitcase, into Mittelt's. That hers is actually _bigger_ than Mittelt's is in no way an impediment to the task. Nothing is trapped, or even warded; Kalawarner had a… unique view on the concept of personal property.

Mostly that there was no such thing.

Leaving her room far better clothed—sort of—than you came, you move on to your own. Everything is exactly where you left it, and you toss it all haphazardly into Mittelt's suitcase, trusting to whatever array of sorting seals are no doubt inside to take care of the problem the same way it did for everything else you shoved in there. Ritual supplies, clothes, identification, the pendant Azazel gave you to mark you as one of the Grigori, and more: everything you brought with you is soon packed away.

Dohnaseek's room is the last one left, and, unsurprisingly, it's almost completely bare. Even on extended missions, he never brought much. You're still not quite sure why. About the only thing worth taking is his laptop; his phone's not there, and that means he must have had it on him when he died. Unfortunate, but not catastrophic, given everything else you've managed to collect here.

Finally, you have everything you came for. Now it's time to see if the exorcists left anything behind.

You're just about to open the trapdoor to the church proper when something blooms against the edge of your senses.

It feels very, very familiar.

You curl your Light around yourself and dampen the bonfire of your soul as far as you can, stepping away from the ladder toward the corner of the room and dismissing your magelights. You hope he comes down here. You really, really do.

You owe Freed Sellzen _quite a lot_ , and you would welcome the chance to collect.


	6. Awakening 1-6

You are still for a terribly long moment, listening to Freed Sellzen whistle the tune of _How Great Art Thou_ less than two metres above your head, and then you turn and walk away.

Your right hand feels wet.

It's only when you lift it up to open the trapdoor that you realise it's because you're bleeding. You uncurl the fist and carefully unlatch the lock, the metal digging into the open wounds on your palm. Your nails are strangely beautiful, stained as they are by star-gold ichor. They leave tiny scorch-marks on the wood of the trapdoor as you push it out of the way. You drag Mittelt's suitcase out and shut your exit behind you, careful to ensure it doesn't slam shut. As you leave, you dismiss your temporary disguise in favour of the face of Raven Black.

Soon the church is fading into the distance, and Freed Sellzen with it.

You almost walk out in front of a car on your way back to the hotel, but it stops just in time. The impact probably wouldn't have killed you. Your stomach rumbles, but you don't really care. There are more important things to worry about. You turn down the last street to the hotel, and run straight into a man. His face slams into your shoulder, which apparently has a consistency similar to a brick wall if the way he bounces off is any indication.

You shove him aside and keep walking. Angry Japanese echoes over your shoulder, but it cuts off when you turn and look at him. He flinches away from your gaze, like he was staring into the sun, and you return your attention to the pavement in front of you.

Soon enough, you're at the hotel, and you walk straight past the receptionist to the stairs, dragging the suitcase behind you with a single hand. You lift it up the steps, and slap open the door to your room, overloading the lock with a spark of sorcery rather than bothering to slip the keycard out of the waistband of your underwear. You shut the door behind you, and carefully place the suitcase beside it.

Then you rip a light-spear from the air and _stab_ it into the bed with a scream, scorching a hole from the top of the sheets to the bottom of the mattress.

You punctuate the exclamation with another spear.

He was _right there_. You had Freed Sellzen within your grasp, and you let him go. Because you're so _weak_ , so incredibly, fantastically _useless_ that you couldn't guarantee killing him fast enough that it wouldn't risk alerting the Devils that you're still alive. Because you're so scared of the fucking _teenagers_ who killed you that you'd sacrifice a shot at the son of a bitch who left you to die just to avoid their attention.

In the background, you hear the smoke alarm blare, but it's a dull, irrelevant thing against the choking rage that boils through your veins like magma.

You only realise you are shaking when someone pounds on the door and it takes you three tries to swipe a hand against the card-reader. Outside is the security guard from earlier, who rushes past you with a fire extinguisher in hand. He looks confused for a moment when he sees the bed, until you wrench him around by the wrist so he's facing you and plunge your Light into his mind. It rips through his thoughts like a dagger through flesh.

 _Forget_ , you snarl. His eyes glaze over, and you yank him toward the door, shoving one last command home. _Leave!_

You slam the door after him, and a third spear slags the smoke alarm and part of the wall behind it.

"God _damnit!_ "

You stand there for what seems like hours, rage trembling from every volcanic breath, until finally you feel calm enough to walk over to Mittelt's—now your—suitcase and pull out a series of wardstones from the ritual reagents you packed earlier. They're dull, basic things, but you only need them to sure up your privacy ward. It was good enough to prevent the cleaners from coming in, based on the state of the bed when you arrived, but it didn't keep the security guard out when he thought there was a genuine emergency.

You coat them with Light and plunge them into the wardspace each glyph resonates within, and the stones start to hum as they take up the burden of supporting it. That frees the glyphs up to be refined, and soon enough you've done the magical equivalent of replacing single-word grunts with full and proper sentences.

(You have also done the literal—and literary—equivalent, because wards are not so much shaped as spelled).

That done, you return to your suitcase to pull out Dohnaseek's laptop and charger. You don't know the password, but you also have fucking magic, so that's not as much of a problem as one might expect. You set it on the desk, plug it in, and lay a hand on the keyboard, whispering in a language not heard by human ears since before the rise of Rome. Awareness blooms in your mind like sunlight, and you can feel the way Dohnaseek's fingers once flitted across the keys, snapping together words like a bird pecking at seeds.

Phantom memories ebb and flow as you trace back the laptop's history until you reach the last time Dohnaseek logged into it: his password is, apparently, 'keesanhod'. How original. A few moments later, you've entered it, and his desktop fades into view.

The background is a photo of Kalawarner.

A very crisp photo of a very naked Kalawarner.

 _Huh_.

You pull up an internet browser, and abruptly realise you forgot to connect to it in the first place. Thankfully, the hotel has free wifi, so setting that up only delays you a couple of seconds. While you've seen a few maps of the city—enough to know your way around—none of them were particularly detailed, nor did they focus on what's important to you now.

No: you're not looking at Kuoh Academy or the area around the abandoned church anymore, except maybe to ensure you're staying as far away from them as possible. You have a different priority.


	7. Awakening 1-7

It's easy enough to find what you're looking for – according to the internet, there are several motorbike stores or dealerships in Kuoh. One's nearby. You type the address into the mapping function, and memorise the route. Doesn't look like it'll take longer than half an hour to get there, which is convenient; you could go, get a bike or scooter or whatever, and still have plenty of time to plan where you're going next. Depending on how long that takes, you might even be able to leave before it gets dark.

You hope it works out that way. Leaving in the night, when the Devils will be not only stronger but also free to pursue anything that catches their interest… yeah, you'd prefer not to take your chances. It's paranoia at its finest—there's no way they can know you're still alive—but you have good reason, considering how intimately you know the consequences of carelessness.

Closing down the laptop, you stand, and your stomach rumbles again. Hmm. Looks like you'll be grabbing something to eat along the way. And you might even pay for it this time; you collected Kalawarner's purse from her room, the one that has all the cards for the various accounts she's established over the centuries inside. She was too much of an impulsive spender—and compulsive gambler—for there to be any vast fortunes squirreled away, but you're pretty sure you can afford a motorbike and a meal.

It's not like you have any compunctions with theft, but when you have the time, it's usually easier to do things legally. Inevitably you'll have to work some magic in order for whoever's in charge of the dealership to ignore the fact you don't have a licence, and are ostensibly a tourist, but all that takes is a couple of quick illusions or a brief piece of hypnosis. Not nearly comparable to hacking records and manipulating camera feeds and so on just so they don't wonder why they're down the exact cost of the bike a random woman just walked out with.

You grab the purse from the suitcase, alongside the little black book that has, amongst other things, all the security and pin codes you'll need to actually _use_ the cards within it. It seems sort of silly that a Fallen Angel—with a perfect racial memory—would need reminders like that, but Kalawarner's position was that anyone who managed to steal from her deserved whatever they took. Thus, the book, complete with instructions for any potential thief on how to spend all their hard-earned money.

It doesn't take you very long to leave the hotel, nor stop by a convenience store to pick up a snack—the first card you tried worked, thankfully—and shortly after that you're approaching the dealership. It starts to snow on the way there; thick, fat flakes that prompt you to draw your Light further from your skin. You'd rather not be accidentally found out through some idiot sharing a photo with his friends of a woman who's walking through a cloud of steam instead of snow.

You're just about cross the last street between you and your goal when you're accosted by a stranger. She hands you a flyer silently before moving on, and for a moment you blink in confusion. What was that about? You almost toss it over your shoulder on reflex, but a flash of red on the surface catches your eye, and you glance down.

Then you start to laugh.

Oh, that's _fantastic_.

In your hands is an ordinary piece of paper – emblazoned with the Japanese for "Your dream will come true!" and a _Devil-style summoning circle_. Looking over your shoulder, you see the 'woman' handing them out to everyone she passes. How amusing. Returning your attention to the contract—because it can be nothing else—in your hand, you let your Light play around the edges, getting a feel for the mechanism without risking setting it off.

Ah. It tastes like ash. Like dust. Like ruin.

 _Gremory_.

You have in your grasp a currently-inert summoning contract for Rias Gremory or one of her servants.

What do you do? The obvious. A hand slips it into your pocket, and you continue on your way to the dealership.

"Good afternoon, ma'am," the obsequious salesman says, eyes flickering from your chest to your face and back to your chest, "how may I be of assistance?"

You look around slowly, taking in the various scooters and motorcycles set up in the showroom. Nothing stands out to you in particular, which is good, because you have no desire to ride away in something distinctive. You're eye-catching enough on your own. On impulse, you point toward a slim, black thing close to one of the walls; it looks like a moped's older, sexier sister.

"How much is that?" you ask.

"Ah, the Skywave? ¥800,000," he replies. "It's a very good bi—"

"I'll take it," you say. You have no need for useless prattle.

The rest of the transaction proceeds similarly – you steamroll over everything he says and does that isn't directly facilitating your purchase, and laugh at the way he calls you a bitch in his own head when you slip in to convince him to ignore your lack of a licence and British passport. As far as you're concerned, that's a compliment.

Doesn't stop you from hypnotising him into offering to fill the bike up completely out of his own pocket, but to be fair you were going to do that regardless.

Soon enough, you're the uncaring owner of a Suzuki Skywave and a helmet that barely fits half your hair. You'd go without—your head would stand up better to an impact than some shitty plastic helmet—but it's apparently required by law, and you'd rather not deal with being pulled over by traffic cops every kilometre or something. Oh well.

You ride it back to the hotel to get a feel for how the scooter works; it's been a few decades since you last used one of these things. Thankfully, the basic principle is the same, and your reflexes are far too good to be troubled by any of the minor mistakes you make along the way. Parking it outside, you head to your room, and more importantly Dohnaseek's laptop. You'll need another map of the city, and perhaps Japan as a whole.

You know it's time to leave Kuoh. But one question remains.

Where are you going to go?


	8. Awakening 1-8

The wind is cold against your skin.

You make for an unusual sight on the road; a slim girl on a too-small bike, hair spilling out of your helmet like someone's stitched the night sky into ten thousand flawless strands. Your skirt is short enough to be weaponised, and the pale ethereality of your legs shimmer in the light of distant stars and headlamps both. You slip between cars like a particularly daring shadow, trusting to your reflexes to guide you as you think.

You're still not sure if you made the right decision to go to Kyoto.

Sure. You'll be safe there. The youkai—regardless of faction—don't care about the Fallen, or Heaven, or the Devils, as long as they don't interfere in youkai business. Hell, Devils can even get fucking _passes_ to wander around Kyoto in spiritual safety, though the bureaucracy involved means it's never a popular pastime. As long as you keep your head down and don't cause any trouble, you could walk past a Shinto priest or a pack of kitsune without a care in the world, and if Gremory tracks you there, she'll be forced to stay away by the very politics she was born into. If she even wants to finish the job. Again. The rich array of leylines that stitch their way across the city don't hurt either; they mean you'll never lack for a little extra kick in your rituals. You'll need to read whatever books Mittelt had on the subject first to brush up on your knowledge, but that's no hardship.

Rationally, Kyoto was a better decision than anything else open to you.

You considered Romania, but in the end that felt too much like cowardice. The scenery would be nice, and the ability to work almost unquestioned and potentially unopposed would be lovely, but you couldn't live with the knowledge that a bunch of fucking _teenagers_ had scared you so much you ran halfway across the world to make sure they'd never find you. Going to Kyoto isn't running. It's just… tactical repositioning.

You considered the Grigori, too. You thought of Azazel's smile, when he found out the reports were wrong and you were still alive. You thought of Shemhazai's eyes, when he learned you'd survived death and were suddenly _interesting_. You thought of the mocking grins and whispered comments of your peers about the useless bitch who fucked up her assignment twice over and got all her friends killed.

No.

Going back to the Grigori feels too much like failure.

That doesn't mean part of you stops wishing you could.

But here you are. Alone on an empty road, riding away from the city that murdered your dreams, and you almost as an afterthought. And the worst thing is you can't help but think it might—just maybe—have been your fault. You were the one in charge. The one who didn't check if the Devils had done anything to keep an eye on the Sacred Gear wielder in their midst. Who didn't bother to pick the fucking nun up at the airport. Who dragged Kalawarner, Dohnaseek, and Mittelt into the mess, and trusted that Freed Sellzen would obey you for existing.

A less charitable person might say you don't deserve to be alive.

But nevertheless, you are.

And you are way too old for a fucking _pity party_.

You've got a long road ahead of you, and not just to Kyoto. So what if you failed the first time? You're a Fallen Angel – and a real one, too. Not born. _Made_. One of the last true legacies of God, his triumphs and failures both; ancient beyond comprehension and beautiful beyond compare. You've got all the time in the world—all the time the world will ever have—to do whatever you want to.

Right now, you're feeling like revenge.

You treated Hyoudou like the dog you thought he was instead of the dragon he turned out to be; Gremory did the same to you, except you're no dragon. You've always wanted to be stronger. Always thought God should have made you to be more. But there's a difference between standing in Azazel's shadow and wishing for the power to make him notice you, and being executed in humiliation and disgrace because you were too fucking _weak_.

You've spent your whole life waiting for strength to fall into your lap. Didn't happen this century? Not a problem, you've got plenty more left. An opportunity will come. Just keep waiting. Well, you waited. You waited three thousand years, and died on your very first chance. Imagine what you could have done instead of fucking around—in every sense of the phrase—and pining after two men whose sneezes are more powerful than you are.

Azazel used to be a _Seraph_. Why would he notice a shitty little girl like you when he was on a first-name basis with Gabriel? Shemhazai is married. What reason does he have to consider some pathetic needy brat over a powerful Devil wife with infinite potential for growth and the ability to give him a child strong enough to survive the enemies their heritage will earn them?

You've wasted too much of your life hoping.

It's time to start doing.

You'll figure out why you're still alive. Why you have more Light than you're supposed to. If there's a way to replicate the process, through rituals that haven't been invented yet or something else entirely. You'll devour Mittelt's library until you know everything she did and more. You've always been a sucker for sorcery.

You'll find another Sacred Gear to steal.

You'll get smarter. Get stronger.

And some day _you'll_ be the one standing over Gremory and Hyoudou as they beg for their lives.

Who knows?

You might even listen.


	9. Discovery 2-1

It turns out there's a standard procedure for hiring warehouse space in Kyoto, on the supernatural side of things at least. So many would-be sorcerers—most of them human, in point of fact—flock to the city at least once in their lives for a chance to work alongside its leylines that renting out ritual spaces has become routine. All you had to do was declare you acknowledged your responsibility for any damages a backfiring ritual might cause, pay the appropriate fees, and kick back and wait while your request was processed.

Which leads you to where you are now – lounging on the small bed in your small apartment, a bottle of cider in one hand and one of Mittelt's tomes in the other. They said it'd be three days until you were assigned somewhere to start your research, and it's only been two. You tilt the alcohol up to your mouth and swallow, wetting your lips and whetting your appetite both. It's light and crisp, like you're drinking a cool spring breeze that took a detour through an orchard.

It's your fifth bottle in a couple of hours. Just enough to give you a pleasant buzz—like you've wrapped yourself in a quilt—but you're supposed to be studying, so it seems fairly counterproductive to get properly drunk. The words on the page you just flipped over seem a little clearer than they did before you started, though not quite as important either. Oh well. You'll get through it eventually. Just not tonight.

Dropping the book beside you on the plain white bedsheet, you arch into a stretch, holding the lip of the bottle between a couple of fingers to make sure it doesn't spill as you crack the other arm behind your back. It's three o'clock in the morning, and you've been stuck in this room all day, brushing up on leylines. Tomorrow—well, today, really—will be devoted to redesigning the Sacred Gear extraction ritual; you're pretty sure you know what you have to do. It's a two-step process: connection, then extraction. Cut off the second, and it'll do exactly what you want it to.

It won't be quite _that_ simple; an unfinished ritual with a hold on your soul, a whole lot of power coursing through it, and no instructions on what to do next would have consequences somewhere between horrific and unmentionable. You'll need to sand around the edges, stitch together the equivalent of a few trailing sentences, and make absolutely sure that you remember to include a command to cancel the entire process if anything at all starts to go wrong. But you don't expect that to be _absurdly_ complicated, not between your own skill, experience, and vast array of reference materials.

You stand, sculling the rest of the bottle in a easy motion long worn smooth by practice, and drop it by its empty fellows on the bedside table. Getting that—and the proper bed to replace the ubiquitous futon—was a chore and a half, mostly because you had to carry the fucking things up twenty flights of stairs to reach your apartment door. Lifting either wasn't the hard part – but maneuvering them through cramped doors and stairwells took you far longer than it had any right to.

Time to get out of this place, at least for the rest of the night. You haven't been to Kyoto for a few decades, and it'll be interesting to see how the city has changed. You remember the places non-youkai are supposed to stay away from, so as long as you don't end up there somehow, you'll be fine. Alone as you are, that means no getting blackout drunk, because there's nobody to make sure you get back to your apartment, or more importantly _don't_ get to anywhere you shouldn't.

Oh well. You're no Mittelt, constantly striving to see if a Fallen Angel can survive with more alcohol than blood, and you've got work to do soon anyway. Guess the bartenders will have to miss you rather than kiss you. How unfortunate.

You're almost out the door when you remember something rather important.

A couple of minutes, you're almost out the door again – this time wearing clothes.

You shut it behind you and turn the key, trusting to a mixture of locks and privacy wards to keep any unwanted visitors away, and slip down the stairs. Not literally. Figuratively. You're not that clumsy. It's a different key to get out of the apartment proper, and soon enough you're on the streets. Streetlamps and shadows dapple your skin. It's a nice night. Relaxing, even.

Your exhale is a slow, sighing thing. The night air chills your breath to mist, and you wave it away before you walk into it. There's a park nearby, according to the map you consulted after you rented the apartment, and you find yourself drifting toward it. You want to relax for a little while – and relax somewhere you can see the stars from.

Sure, your apartment is relatively clean, home to Mittelt's alcohol collection, and warded against intrusion.

But you didn't Fall to be caged, not by God and certainly not by yourself.

The park is beautiful in the moonlight; the wind whispers through the leaves, and you kick off your boots to feel the grass against your toes. You're far too dignified to laugh at the way it tickles your feet. You meander from one end to another like a cloud drifting through the open sky, enjoying the chill that prickles your flesh. There are a lot of things you hate God for, but this world isn't one of them.

Eventually, you find a bench, throwing yourself down and leaning over the back. You cross your legs, each one a flash of moonsilver skin; your eyes blink shut, and for a while only your breath distinguishes you from a corpse. You don't know how it feels to sleep, but you imagine it's something a little like this.

Your peace is soon disrupted by footsteps, staccato-sharp against the pavement of the garden path. They're too controlled to be anything other than deliberate. Whoever's coming wants to be heard. Beneath your skin, your Light trembles, and you call it close enough to drive away the cold. One hand rests against the bench, ready to push you away, and you lean forward as if planning to replace your boots – and more importantly, ensure your wings have room to unfold.

You look up a second or two after you hear the sound, as if constrained to human senses.

You see raven hair and gold eyes. A body even you'd be envious of, wrapped up in a dress that looks like it's one step from begging to be taken off. Her smile is soft and sly, like a secret.

How interesting.


	10. Discovery 2-2

"Hello, stranger," the stranger says, her voice as smooth and rich as whiskey. "What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?"

You laugh despite yourself, digging your feet just that little bit more securely into the grass. "Has that line ever worked on anybody?"

Then you look her up and down. Again. She's closer, now, eyes glittering the colour of firelight, and the way her dress slips further and further off one perfect shoulder suggests the only line she needs is the one leading to her bedroom. Her hips sway with careless debauchery each time she takes a step. Every inch of her form is an invitation that would be less blatant if she were entirely naked.

Kitsune, then, and young at that to be trying this hard.

You relax imperceptibly, sitting back and crossing your legs. If you're in any danger here, it's only of a good time.

"Don't be rude." Her pout is devastating. "I'm just curious! It's not often you meet a Fallen Angel all out on their lonesome."

"Hmm? Fallen Angel?" you ask, schooling your face and body to amused bemusement. "Is that a prelude to that whole 'did it hurt when you fell from Heaven' thing? Because you'll be two for two from terrible cliches, then."

You smirk at the flash of panic in her eyes, even as she drapes herself across the rest of the bench, only a couple of inches shy of far too close. She smells of sakura blossoms and smoke.

"Don't tease me!" she says, scowling softly. "I know what you are. I could taste it."

She seems awfully proud of that, for some reason.

"Fine, fine," you say, throwing an arm across the back of the bench that just so happens to brush her exposed shoulder on the way past, "you got me. Fallen Angel Jehiel, at your service. Who are you?"

The name is temporary, and a joke she surely doesn't get. But if you've left the Grigori, at least for now, there's no point letting your real identity slip even in a place as safe as this. You'll pick a better one later.

"I'm Ruri," she replies, rolling each 'r' in a way you last heard in Russia, "and you still haven't answered my question!"

You shrug in a very particular way, and her eyes aren't quite fast enough in flicking down to your chest and back to escape your attention – nor does it escape hers that you noticed, either. She doesn't flush, but she does glance away out into the park. Typical kitsune arrogance. A few lessons from her brothers and sisters, a few mortals led around by the tail, and she think that means she's ready to play the game with someone like _you_.

Oh, she's attractive. Absurdly so. If you didn't have a ritual to get to later, you'd consider it. But you do, and that means no distractions, no matter how bewitching their features or fluffy their tails.

"You haven't earned the answer yet," you say, smiling the same way she did when you first saw her. "Nice dress, though. Where'd you get it?"

There's only one thing holding up that dress. Well, two things. And maybe a little magic.

She pouts again at your answer, but brightens at the question, holding her head haughtily high and exposing the pale length of her neck, stained almost darker than the surrounding night by her hair.

"My sister gave it to me. She's very important, you know! She even met Lady Yasaka once."

Well. Isn't _that_ interesting. A young, almost naive kitsune approaches a lone Fallen Angel and claims to be related to someone in proximity to Yasaka's court. How convenient. If there's any saying from Heaven you still sympathise with, it's the one about God preferring war to politics. You're not quite sure what the trap is, or even if it exists, but what are the odds of this meeting being anything except engineered by _someone?_ You don't think it's the girl herself—she's probably exactly what she looks like—but there's one way to gauge how much they want… whatever it is they want.

To leave.

"She has excellent taste," you say, sweeping your eyes across every inch of her skin the way another woman might stroke it. "It was good to meet you, Ruri. Maybe I'll see you around. If you're lucky."

You stand, your hand slipping from the bench to her shoulder almost by accident; your Light, still bubbling close to the surface, means your flesh is as hot as kissing. She starts almost in surprise, and you leave with your laughter on the air, high and free. Ah, amateurs. So easy.

There's no point heading back to your apartment quite yet. Dawn hasn't arrived, and you're still a little restless. The park is soon behind you, and you're wandering through streets and alleyways into the city proper. No idiot tries to rob you or worse—in part because even the idiots are asleep at this time of night—so your walk remains merely refreshing as opposed to enthusiastic. A shame. You've run from so many fights recently that you're feeling a little… restless.

The sun is rising when you return to your apartment, and you clamber up twenty identical flights to reach a door even blander than the walls you passed on the way. You place your key in the lock for the sake of appearances, using the contact to disengage your privacy wards long enough to actually let yourself inside. Everything is naturally exactly as you left it, and soon enough you're unfurling your wings and unpacking some of the most important and fundamental tools of ritual sorcery: pens and paper.

There are six different circles in the Sacred Gear extraction ritual: three you need to scrap entirely, as they relate to unbinding and rebinding the Gear itself, and three you need to modify. That means drafting and redrafting over and over until they'll do—theoretically—exactly what you want them to do. While ensuring the way they combine doesn't fuck anything up in the process.

A few quick sketches later, you remember something: a few weeks back, Mittelt mentioned a book— _Wings Of The Pratītyasamutpāda_ —she'd found from an author who had apparently pioneered an easier way of combining ritual circles. Some based on some new-fangled math that didn't even exist until a century ago. You haven't read it, but if the way Mittelt was ranting about the contents, it'll probably be pretty useful.

Given what you're planning on doing, perhaps you ought to read it _now_.


	11. Discovery 2-3

A short while of rummaging around in your suitcase later, you remove Mittelt's copy of _Wings of the Pratītyasamutpāda_ and open it at the first page. Time to start reading.

Hmm. It seems it begins at, well, the beginning.

 _The first question the ritualist asks is why. Specifically, why bother? There are countless branches of sorcery in this world – not including any racial specialties that the average sorcerer will never be able to learn, let alone use. And some of them, indeed, make ritualism pointless. The biggest offender is, of course, Devil sorcery. There are perhaps one in a thousand Devils who know even the most basic ritual, because the power of a Devil is based on imagination, and the moment they begin to believe that magic has rules and restrictions is the moment they begin to cripple themselves._

 _Or so most Devils would tell you._

 _Personally, I can think of one who would disagree. But I digress._

 _Let us suppose you are not a Devil, for the sake of argument. Still, why should you bother studying ritual sorcery? It is easier to create fire through pyromancy, easier to strengthen your body through touki, easier to understand the world through senjutsu. And indeed, all these things are true. If you are looking for easy, you are reading the wrong book._

 _Rituals are slow. Complicated. And incredibly, incredibly versatile. Certainly, you can throw lightning far more easily—and far more powerfully—if you embrace the stormtrance than if you study ritualism deep enough to write one to do it for you. But then you will have spent months, maybe years, on a single art – yet if you knew how to write a ritual for lightning, you could write one for fire, for ice, for wind and water and probably for scrambling a pair of eggs, if my experience as a poor, desperate student of sorcery is any indication._

 _With that said, discard all your ambitions of being a front-line combatant as a ritualist. Unless you are the sort of peerless talent to be spoken of in the same breath as some of the most powerful existences in this world, you will never be able to employ a ritual of sufficient complexity with the speed, accuracy, or power to be worth it. The point of learning ritual sorcery is not to wade into war and emerge unscathed._

 _No: your skills are best employed to ensure that the war never makes it to your doorstep in the first place. The strength of ritualism is its versatility, as I said – but this versatility, for the most part, comes in the form of all the disciplines of sorcery that descend from or be mimicked by it. A competent ritualist can summon, ward, simulate most spells to a lesser degree—if they know or can construct the right circle, which, to be fair, is usually at least as much work as learning that spell in the first place—and if the rumours coming out of the Grigori are correct, even extract and transfer a Sacred Gear._

You smile, amused, and return to reading.

 _As I said before, Devil sorcery is fuelled by imagination. Ritualism is fuelled by circles – and circles are fuelled by language. Unfortunately, as much as I would like to draw parallels, you can imagine that 'hubba bubba bing bong' means something as hard as you want, but you won't get a ritual out of it. Yes, I have tried. In order for a circle to have an effect, and generate a ritual, it needs to make sense._

 _By now, you're probably wondering why I have begun by reminding you of all the things you must already know. The answer is simple: because the point of this book is to take you all the way back to the basics and show you an entirely new way to use them, and the best way to start at the beginning is to, well,_ _start at the beginning. But rejoice, for with the fundamentals of ritual sorcery returned to your mind, I may now ask a more complicated question._

 _What do you think the language of the universe is?_

 _An Angel might say Enochian. A Devil might say there is no such thing. A mute might roll their eyes at you. But they are all wrong._

 _The language of the universe, my friend, is math. It has taken a very long time for humanity to discover the_ _right math to describe it at any significant level of complexity, but we are now branching out into areas that perhaps not even the gods foresaw. And the singular beauty of mathematics is that it means the same thing no matter what or where in the world you are. It is more than the language of the universe – it is the universal language._

You blink, tilting your head to the side as you start to cycle through languages in your head. A hundred different words for addition bounce around, yet you draw the same symbol every time. Sure, you remember a time before it existed – but exist it does, and so ubiquitously that it's no wonder you've never thought of it before. Not seeing the trees for the forest, to reverse an old saying. But that means…

If you were able to write all your circles in the same language _all the time_ , rather than sometimes being forced to cycle between them—occasionally even within the same circle—then you could combine them far more easily.

Your eyes flick down to the next line.

 _And that is what makes it perfect for the purpose of combining circles._

Well, that takes away the thrill of thinking of it yourself, if you were only a single line faster than the book itself intended to be. How disappointing. But this is still the most interesting piece of ritual theory you've read in a thous—and _completely useless_ because the Sacred Gear extraction ritual is written entirely in Enochian, and learning how to replicate it with mathematics you've never even studied will not make the task of combining and adjusting it any easier.

What a colossal fucking waste of your time.

You're halfway to tossing it across the room in a fit of pique when you pause. No. That's wrong. It's of no help _right now_ , but you can think of ten rituals off the top of your head where the principles this book espouses would be relevant. Just because it doesn't help you in your immediate goal doesn't meant that it's worthless. You place it carefully down beside the bed to finish reading later, and turn back to the task of modifying the extraction ritual. You're not quite sure what you're going to call it, but that doesn't really matter – you already know what it's going to do, so the label is unimportant.

It's time to comprehend. You might not learn everything there is to know about your soul – but by God, you will learn it well.


	12. Discovery 2-4

Twenty-seven hours later, it is done. The circles are blended. They say exactly what you want them to say. You have devoured three separate tomes on leyline interactions to make sure they will integrate properly. You have fed your Light through each circle, testing to ensure they won't detonate in your face before you even start. You have done everything you can think of to make sure that your ritual will work – and then double-checked, just in case.

As it has been since well before dawn, your stomach takes a moment to growl at you like you've swallowed a lion. Which is exactly what you could really go for right now. You stand, finally, luxuriating in the simple chance to move, and toss open the curtains across your apartment's window to let in the light. It haloes you—oh, the irony—as you stretch first one wing and then the other with the languid indolence of a cat. Ah. That's better.

Shaking the tension from the rest of your body, you gather up the dozens of scribbled-on sheets that comprise all the mistakes you made before you managed to get something right and stuff them into one of the innumerable folders you've collected for the task over the years. It's a good habit to get into, as a ritualist, for much the same reason authors don't entirely scrap their first drafts and mathematicians don't toss out every single pad they go through. That done, you rummage—as much as you can, given the automatic sorting seals—around your luggage for something to wear, eventually settling on a pair of loose jeans and a looser shirt.

You flush what little dirt and grime you've accumulated off your skin with a simple spell and slip on your clothes, folding your wings regretfully away to the shadow in which they rest. There was a time when there was no such thing as the Masquerade—when you could walk around openly as who and what you are—and it's moments like this that make you miss it the most. Sighing, you pluck Kalawarner's wallet off the bedside table; you'll need it to finish paying for the ritual space, since today is the day you're due to return to find out where it is, and of course to go get something to eat.

Right on cue, your stomach sounds off again. Surprisingly, the walls don't tremble.

You descend the stairs and soon enough are slipping through Kyoto's streets. The office you'll need to go to is close to the center, disguised as an actual warehouse-renting business. You're too mentally drained to risk performing your ritual right away, so the plan is to find food, learn the location you've been allocated, and then relax for a while.

Idly, you wonder if Ruri will turn up again. That would be as entertaining as it would be mildly concerning.

You haven't been walking for too long when you spot a Russian restaurant, imaginatively called Restaurant Kiev. Russian sounds interesting enough for today, and you're a little too hungry to be bothered looking anywhere else. The interior is relatively plain—cream walls and blue-backed chairs—but that's fine by you: it's a place for eating, not for appreciating art. (You once told a food critic that. His expression was glorious). The maître d' leads you to your table, and it's only a couple of minutes before your waitress arrives.

You hear her before you see her, and look up.

 _Huh_.

"Jehiel!" Ruri says. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm hungry, and unfortunately I'm a terrible cook," you say, and then flick your eyes to where the restaurant's waitress outfit is doing an admirably abysmal job at constraining Ruri's Ruris before returning them to her face. "I much prefer eating out."

She doesn't flush—she wouldn't be kitsune if she did—but she does swallow slightly, as if her throat was suddenly a little too dry.

You wait until Ruri has just opened her mouth before you speak up again. "Are you going to ask me something?"

"Yes! I mean, honoured customer, how may I serve you?"

"By not calling me that," you reply, turning a little to face her in your seat and leaning back to open your posture. "Or Jehiel, for that matter. Jehiel is the name God gave me, and fuck him. My friends know me as Sabetha."

"Then why didn't you say that in the first place?" she asks, balance admirably recovered – or at least supplanted by her indignation. The accompanying pout is no less dangerous the second time.

"Assuming friendship with someone you just met? How bold." Your blush is a work of art. "I was too overwhelmed by the sight of you to think of such things!"

"That's not how I remember our meeting going," she says, eyes darting to her shoulder almost involuntarily.

You laugh, as if abashed.

"Why do you think I left so quickly? A lady cannot be uncouth in public, Ruri," you say. Her name leaves your lips almost reluctantly, like you're savouring the way it tastes. Then you glance past her. "Is there a reason the maître d' is glaring at you?"

She starts, her eyes shifting from where your shirt hangs low enough to expose your collarbones to behind her, and pulls out a notepad faster than you've seen some men draw a blade. "F-forgive me! What would you like to order?"

"I think I'll have the Baikal, with an extra bottle of Perrier," you say. "Is there anything you recommend for afterward? I'm especially fond of sweet things."

Your eyes are, of course, coincidentally resting on her lips as you finish speaking.

"I've always enjoyed the apple tart," she replies. Outwardly, Ruri's voice is as smooth and inviting as a lake in summer, but she's not looking anywhere except your lips either. How cute.

"Then I'll have that too. Thank you, Ruri." You roll the r's the same way she does, with that little trilling inflection.

She's still for about a second before she scurries off, and you take a moment to appreciate the view. You might be in love with someone else, but you're certainly not dead. Anymore.

A different waitress returns with your dishes after a surprisingly short time, and you can see Ruri being lectured by the maître d' at the back of the room. Looks like this isn't the first time she's been caught paying too much attention to a guest. What a naughty, naughty girl.

You eat quickly out of habit, half-expecting to hear Kalawarner mock you for what she called your sparrow impression. The meal is quite nice, and more honest to the Russian cuisine you remember than the restaurant back in Kuoh was to Italian. You might make a note of this place for later – though only in part because of the food. If Ruri works here—this close to your apartment—then it's a little more likely your first meeting was coincidence.

Only a _little_ more likely, though, which is why you're going to make sure you know exactly where the place is just in case you want to avoid it. You're not paranoid. Just… careful.

You wait until Ruri is free before signalling that you're ready to go, and naturally she's at your table almost immediately. Eschewing one of Kalawarner's cards, you instead count out the cash, and press it into Ruri's hands, accidentally clasping them between yours in the process. When you stand, it's almost like you're pulling yourself up with her help.

"There might be a little extra in there," you say as your fingers linger, "if you're feeling lucky. You _did_ meet me again, after all. Have a nice day, Ruri!"

You're walking away before she can reply.

Restaurant Kiev fades into the distance, and an hour or so later you're outside the office you visited to book your ritual berth when you arrived. The doors slide open as you walk toward them, and you're in front of one of the clerks a few seconds later. You rattle off your booking number when asked, and wait while his keyboard clatters and he looks up your details.

Thankfully, it's not too long before he starts to speak, telling you the exact ritual berth you've been allocated for the next forty-eight hours: close to the centre of Kyoto, at an intersection of three different leylines. Somewhere much better than it _should_ be. Apparently you got lucky enough to book at exactly the right time, when it had just freed up.

Yeah, because _your_ luck is definitely that good.

And right after you met Ruri again too.


	13. Discovery 2-5

How interesting.

A baby kitsune stumbles on you while you're wandering at an hour of the morning most people like to forget exists, and propositions you almost _because_ of what you are. Then just over a day later, you find—and flirt with—her a second time. Now you're being told that there's been a wonderfully convenient mix-up in the system, and you've been allocated a site near the heart of Kyoto better than even your wildest hopes, only hours after demonstrating your apparent receptiveness to her advances.

Well, if they're going to add _that_ much honey to the trap, who are you to refuse?

It's not like they're going to kill you. Or worse. Anyone with enough influence to arrange for a gift like the ritual site you've been offered would have far less trouble with something as simple as abduction or murder. After all, you're living alone, registered in various bureaucratic systems, and you've spent hours wandering by yourself through the city. They've had more than enough opportunity.

(You ignore the possibility that this is really all just coincidence. Pull the other one, it's got bells on it).

"Give them my thanks," you say, taking the proffered chit that'll grant you access to the warehouse and the room both. The man blinks at you, as if surprised. You expected nothing different.

The journey back to your apartment is swift; you're not flying, but you're not ambling either. Legs long enough to kill a man and strength enough to make that literal mean you can walk faster than most humans jog, or in some cases run. You've prepared as best you can, and you only have the ritual site for two days. You don't expect the ritual to take that long, but you might want to cast it more than once – and even if you don't, you've already wasted quite enough time over the millennia.

It only takes a minute to unpack your ritual reagents. Mostly because you don't bother, and simply grab your suitcase to bring along. You haven't studied sealing to any great degree—that sort of esoteric space-time manipulation is mostly useless for someone of your, well, lack of raw power—and you thought you'd always be able to rely on Mittelt anytime you needed what she once joked was a 'bag of holding'.

The apartment door slams behind you as you leave.

Soon enough, the heart of Kyoto dawns before you. You feel it beneath your skin, as if someone's clamped a fist around your veins. It pulses to a beat on the edge of hearing, like you're listening to snatches of a song from some faraway room. You were never this close, the last time you were here – you can understand why they say Kyoto dances to Yasaka's tune, if this is the music she plays.

The warehouse you're seeking looks just like every other one it borders, and the door opens easily under your touch. The chit you were given is warm in your fingers. There's a man lounging against the wall, a kiseru to his lips. He looks like he just stepped out of James Dean's closet. Five tails sway behind him.

"Huh," he says, exhaling a smoke ring in the shape of a woman. Her proportions mirror yours. "That was fast. Only got confirmation you'd picked up the chit under an hour ago."

"I've got plenty of work to do," you reply. There's no point being wary. You'd lose a fight to a five-tails even if you were expecting one, and you don't have time to feel angry about it. "Which room is mine?"

"Straight to business, I see." He sounds amused. "Didn't expect that in a Fallen. Down the hall, second on the right. Press the chit against the seal to get in."

A door shimmers into existence next to him, opening at a brush of his tails; it reveals a long hallway with dozens of evenly-spaced symbols—the seals he mentioned, presumably—on either side. The door, still visible on this side, clicks shut behind you as you walk through. The sound seems almost insulting in such cavernous silence, and you feel half-a-hundred wards pressing down against your senses like someone's taken a vice to the air and started to squeeze. No doubt there are more intentionally concealed.

Your room is, as the directions indicated, almost right at the front. The chit sinks into the seal, and the wall slides open to reveal a room about as large as your apartment. It's completely blank – bare stone and nothing else. Exactly what any ritualist wants. In an art that can be ruined by a single misplaced brushstroke or equivalent, a blank canvas is less a bonus and more a requirement.

Before you pull anything out of your luggage, however, there's one thing left to do. Closing your eyes, you open your Light. It's the same trick you used back in Kuoh to scout out the church, only this time you're looking for any traces of foreign sorcery. In a confined space that should be entirely empty except for you and the shadow of nearby leylines, you'll have a much better chance of spotting anything that shouldn't be there than you would almost anywhere else.

As expected, you sense nothing out of the ordinary – only the ineffable, ineluctable heartbeat of Kyoto's leylines.

Time to get to work.

It takes you an hour to trace out each circle; you carve them into the floor with your ritual knife, the sun-bright orichalum slicing through stone with ease as you fill the spaces between its atoms with Light. You paint the whirling loops of the first with your blood, cover the harsh angles of the second with silver dust, and the third is left bare entirely. The leylines will fill it soon enough. Looking them over one last time, you're satisfied. Everything is as it should be.

A careful, wing-assisted leap takes you to the centre of the ritual, where every circle meets at a single point, and you sink to sit cross-legged with the conjunction directly beneath you. You time your breaths to your heartbeat and let them slow, until you can't tell where you end and the pulse of the leylines begin. On the eighth, you exhale Light rather than air. Magenta-bright, it slips through every twist and turn you've carved into the floor until it's like the stone is bleeding.

On the sixty-fourth heart-breath, you activate the ritual, and start to fall.

You taste silence on your eyes and hear colour with your teeth. Your bones replace your skin, and you drown in your own blood until you surface choking on sin. Your soul hangs like a distant star behind the thick, congealing smog that has claimed it since your Fall – but it's brighter now, like you'd seen in your soulgaze.

The difference between that and this, however, is you're no longer restricted to looking from afar. Here, you can move. The Sacred Gear extraction ritual is meant to bring the soul out to you; your inversion brings you into the soul. A simple solution, perhaps, but you're fond of the elegance. You walk, each step like you're pushing your way through a howling storm, until the darkness begins to thin and your soul burns bright enough blind you.

You keep looking.

You can hear God's voice—stone against stone, or the babbling of a child, or love—from when you first woke, bright and naked and alive. You remember how his gaze felt, like you'd stop existing when he turned away. You scream as your Fall rips you from Heaven, your wings charring and your Light bubbling like acid. You see Asia Argento's soul, small and dull and kind, offset by the star-sharp tang of a shard of God floating at its centre.

You keep looking.

Your soul is Light. But you are Fallen, and there are sunspots covering yours, bubbling shards of darkness that mark your first, original sin. They are everywhere, because they are everything you are and everything you will ever be. No part of your soul is pure. No part of your soul is redeemable. You are no human, hiding behind the sacrifice of Christ. Angels don't get second chances.

They don't get firsts.

And yet.

Your soul has been silent for two thousand years.

It is no longer.

You can hear it. It sounds like order and glory. It sounds like starlight and dawn. It sounds like cages and chains. It's a song as familiar as your name, because once it was. Each step takes you closer, until your radiance sears your skin and, when you close your eyes, the backs of your eyelids are as bright as midday.

You rest a hand against the simmering core of your soul, and marvel at the way it melts your flesh from your bones.

What should you do?

In the end, the decision is obvious.


	14. Discovery 2-6

There is no doubt in your mind what you must do.

You step forward into your soul. Flesh sloughs off your bones like you're being drawn by Salvador Dali. Your bones crack and split and splinter until your skeleton looks non-Euclidean. Soon enough you don't have a skeleton at all. That doesn't stop you from continuing to walk. Here, your body is somewhere between metaphysical and imaginary, and you didn't even have one when God first forged you.

Oh, it hurts. Of course it does. But you measure pain—this sort of pain, at least—by how it felt to Fall. By the way every quantum of your soul raged against every other as your Light ripped you apart from the inside, and the only thing that kept you sane was rage at the thought it could end like _this_. Burning alive is almost relaxing in comparison.

You follow the song deeper and deeper, one step per beat. _Jehiel_ , it says, like a hammer to your immaterial skull. _Jehiel. Jehiel. Jehiel_. The irony is so beautiful you can't help but smile with the face you don't have. The only place He lives is in your hatred.

Soon enough, you're there, standing in the sublime, shining star-heart of your soul.

In the centre hangs impossibility.

 _I AM._

You settle your eyes on a facet of God for the first time in two thousand, six hundred and thirty-seven years.

Even Twilight Healing was nothing like this. Is this how Vali feels, when Albion calls? Why the Slash Dog seems so far from human even though he is? You thought your soul was blinding, but this makes you glad you don't have eyes.

You can't look away.

There is a shard of God, leaking Light like a wound, in your very core. It was not there before. It has _never been there before_. You were not like this even as an Angel, let alone after you Fell. It's not a Sacred Gear – you know what one looks like. But it feels the same. Why? You—you don't understand. You can't see.

You can't see anything at all.

You wake, eyes wedged shut and gasping for air as you fall backward. On reflex, you flare your wings to keep you up.

Nothing happens.

You're so shocked you don't even remember to catch yourself before your bare back slams into cherry-red stone. A choked scream rips from your lips, and you have to throw yourself forward to escape the scathing, scarring _heat_. Only supreme self-control has you landing on your feet in a corner of the room left unslagged—though not unscorched—by _whatever the fuck just happened_.

The room smells like fire and blood. Then again, maybe that's just you – as you open your eyes gingerly, blinking away shadows, there's a trail of ichor leaking from your nose, and your clothes are not-very-strategically-placed scraps. One fluttering piece of fabric is still smouldering, and you beat a Light-enhanced fist against it to put it out. Or try to, as a stab of agony rips through your veins like lightning and nothing happens.

 _No._

 _No no no not like thi—_

You dive into a soulgaze with the subtlety of despair. Your concentration fractures in an instant, but you saw enough.

You're not crippled. Not permanently. Strands of Light still stretch in a fragile web in the spaces between your bones. You just… blew a metaphysical fuse. Okay. That's—better. Like how breaking both arms is preferable to losing one entirely.

You slip down the wall, bare back grinding against unpolished stone, and run a hand through what's left of your hair. It'd be the work of moments to restore it, or cover it with the illusion of Raven Black and Sabetha, if you could call on the slightest fraction of Light to power the sorcery. But you can't. Not until you heal.

Which means you can't leave, either.

God _damnit_. You slam a fist into the ground, and hiss at the shudder it sends up your arm. Is this what it feels like to be human? It's disgusting. Demeaning. _Pathetic_. Could you even kill a man as you are now? No. That's not the point. Focus on what actually fucking matters, girl. You have somewhere under two days before you're going to get kicked out, and nobody's going to come and check on you until then. That's time you can use, even if you only use it to rest and recover.

And think.

Start from the top. From the outside, your soul looked relatively normal. Brighter than usual, which was and is of course impossible, but a relatively tamer sort of impossible than what came next. Apart from that, it had the same shape, size, and level of sin as before. It was when you got closer that things got stranger.

You heard your name—the name God gave you, not the one you chose for yourself—the way it used to be, before you Fell. A song your soul hasn't sung for thousands of years. You chased it through the Light that makes you what you are, and at the very centre of your everything, you found a shard of God Himself. It wasn't the crystallised miracle of a Sacred Gear. Not exactly. But it felt the same.

You couldn't finish the train of thought from there. You couldn't see. Couldn't see _what?_

The ritual you designed was for comprehension. You wanted to know exactly what you were looking at. And you do. But for that, you had to sacrifice something, and you think it might have been field of vision. You understand what you saw, but you didn't see everything – like you were tossed the middle of a puzzle, but somebody stole the edges.

Okay. That's fine. That's a problem you can fix. Later. Your soul isn't going to explode in your face a second time, because you're not going to touch that part of it a second time. On the whole, it didn't feel unstable, and you'll stake your life—because you're sort of going to have to—on that impression being right. You're pretty sure what happened had _something_ to do with the essence of God within you, and you're confident that as long as you leave that alone, nothing will happen.

That gives you the chance to work on all the other problems. Like the fact you're mostly naked, undisguised, and functionally Lightless—for the moment—in a room you have to leave in the near future. Glancing across the ruined circles, you ascertain that, yes, your suitcase still exists. That's reassuring. It's a bit charred, but the sealing matrices inside haven't undergone cascading chain collapse, or else you wouldn't be around to admire the charring in the first place.

The clothes aren't important. They're mostly tools to remind the eye how much better you'll look without them. The sorcery of your disguise is more than complicated enough to add details like that; if you could restore it, you wouldn't need to worry about flashing the kitsune—or more importantly, the mortal police likely to try and arrest you—in the first place.

No: the single most important task you have right now is getting access to your Light again.


	15. Discovery 2-7

It's tempting to try and fix this. You're no medic—no Fallen is, or can ever be—but you've enough experience with souls, and yours in particular, to at least see where you might want to look. You're not going to, however, because that same experience is telling you what a terrible idea it would be. It hasn't been fifteen minutes since you blew open what in many ways amounts to your nervous system. You're honestly lucky that you can move.

No: you know you're healing, slow and steady. Sometimes the best strategy is simply to hurry up and wait, and that's what you intend to do. Maybe you'll be finished recovering by the time the kitsune comes to kick you out. Maybe you won't. Your illusions are important, but it's not Kyoto you're hiding from. You're not famous enough for anyone who isn't Fallen, a few of the older Angels, or Gremory and her servants to know you by sight. And whatever the people who arranged this room for you want, you're not going to give it to them for free: silence as part of the price is pretty much par for the course.

It'll be embarrassing—humiliating, even—to be found like this, but you can… you'd like to see anyone stare at a shard of God Almighty and come out the same, let alone one that's inside them. The fact you're still alive and sane is a fucking achievement, really.

Pride assuaged, it's time to get dressed and start reading. You wouldn't bother, ordinarily, but the dearth of Light bubbling under your skin means your body is uncomfortably close to mortal, so the stone you're sitting on is fucking unpleasant. You like it rough, but not this sort of rough. The heat is starting to fade, too, and you'd rather your arms and legs not put on their best cobblestones impression as you shiver your ass off.

Standing up takes work, but you manage in the end, and then circle the edges of the room to reach your suitcase. It's tempting to pull out the first set of clothes the sorting seals offer you, but Kalawarner would kill you for wasting your body like that, so in her honour you end up choosing one of her dresses. Even if they have half as much fabric as anything _you'd_ call a dress. She was taller than you, and curvier, unfortunately, so you'll need to do some adjustments.

What a shame. If only you had plenty of spare time and nothing to do with it.

You extract your sewing kit along with the dress—and a folding chair, because fuck sitting on the floor—and get to work. It takes a few hours, plenty of thread, and pricking yourself twice with a needle that should break on your skin, but you don't really notice. It's easy to lose yourself in something like this; the repetitive click-clack of bone on bone with every clockwork stitch, and the quiet satisfaction of creation.

The fit isn't perfect – but it's the good kind of imperfect. The one that's a little too loose down the front to be polite, and just tight enough around the hips to be less inviting and more demanding. You decide on underwear, in the end – there's such a thing as trying too hard. A lesson dear little Ruri still needs to learn; if she asks nicely, you might even teach her.

All that's left is, well, what's left of your hair. There's nothing difficult about the decision to trim one side to match the other; you can grow it back the moment your Light returns, and it's better than looking like you ran face-first into a grenade after a night dancing in a hurricane. It's been awhile since you changed hairstyles anyway, no matter how temporarily: you think it was around the time Genghis Khan was slaughtering his way through Asia.

Wiping off the last of the blood from your nose, courtesy of the ritual backlash, you finish dressing and pack away everything else you pulled out except the chair. Your not-quite-morning ablutions have finished, and a careful glimpse at your core—it seems easier to soulgaze now, which you put down to an increased sensitivity with your soul for obvious reasons—shows your recovery is proceeding roughly as you predicted.

Mittelt's library has plenty of books in it, and for a moment you consider doing a little more reading up on souls, but you'd rather not have the kitsune walk in on you reading something like that. It might give him a clue about exactly what you fucked up—or more accurately, were fucked up by—and you could do without volunteering that sort of information. Better to pick something else: like whatever mathematical textbooks she probably has tucked away, given their relation to particular disciplines of sealing. You need to learn a lot more math if you're going to start writing circles as equations instead of words.

Thankfully, you were right. Mittelt had several textbooks, and you flip one of them open. The last time you went to school was sixty years ago, on a mission you'd prefer to forget but unfortunately can't. On the other hand, however, that means you still remember everything you learned along the way, and it wasn't like you could let any human brat _beat you_. You're familiar enough with the concepts that the first page of Michael Spivak's _Calculus: Third Edition_ doesn't scare you, and neither does the second.

Some time later, you reach the end of the first chapter—the prologue, technically—and raise an eyebrow. Twenty-five practice questions. One with fourteen parts. Well, it's not like you have anything better to do. You fetch a pencil and some paper from your suitcase and get to work.

You're on chapter 24—Uniform Convergence and Power Series—when the wall slides open and the kitsune walks in. He looks around, taking in the melted stone that marks where your circles used to be, the scorch-marks on the walls, and you, lounging back in a chair while reading a book about calculus. Then he shrugs.

"At least it's not an interdimensional orgy," he says. "Anyway, time's up. I'll give you a few minutes to pack, but there's half an hour until I need to ready the room for the next booking and I can't fix it while you're inside. Thanks for your business."

"Right," you reply, closing the textbook and shoving it along with everything else into the suitcase. You stand, stretching in a way that would get you arrested for public indecency, and walk out the hole. If he's not going to comment on your appearance, you're sure as Hell not going to bring it up yourself. You open the door to the rest of the warehouse, closing it behind you as you walk out into the annex you met him in, and then walk out of that too.

The sun is bright and high in the sky as you wheel the suitcase along behind you. A sigh slips from your lips. Your Light is still beyond you; it's started to course through your limbs and spark between your veins, so you're not as vulnerable as you were, but you can't expel it yet. That means no sorcery, and so it is Raynare who takes the streets back to her apartment rather than Raven Black or Sabetha. It would be just your luck if one of your… siblings happened to be on the other side of the road.

(You look across, and even up just in case they're flying. There's nothing there that shouldn't be).

Your apartment building looms before you soon enough, and you march up the stairs. Getting into your room poses a slight challenge, given you can't actually unlock the seals because you can't poke them with your Light, but a solution reveals itself eventually. To your dying day, you will be forever glad that there was nobody around to see you jumping backwards at the door while expelling your wings until the wards clicked open.

After all, your wings are inside you, so you can flare your Light to release them, but in the very moment of that release your Light is technically _outside_ you at the same time, as it has to bridge the gap between reality and your soul. Unfortunately, there's no way you can pull the same trick to restore your security. That problem you won't be able to solve until the next day, based on your rate of recovery so far.

You've just put your suitcase down in the corner when you hear a series of knocks on the door.

"Hello, Raynare," Azazel says. "You're looking well for a corpse. May I come in?"


	16. Discovery 2-8

You are so surprised you don't even remember to wonder how Azazel can see you through the door.

 _What is he doing here?_

"I'll take that as a no, then," he continues. "Should I come back next week?"

You are at the door, wrenching it open so hard the hinges creak, before he finishes the sentence. Your lord—your love—stands before you, the top of his shirt distractingly unbuttoned as usual and his smile as easy as ever. You feel like a flustered child. You probably look like one too. Why didn't you ask him to wait so you could change into something better? Style your hair properly. Maybe crawl under the bed and die.

"My lord," you say instead, "please, come in!"

Your stomach chooses that moment to growl, and you realise you haven't eaten in two days. Maybe if you flutter your eyelashes at Azazel enough, he'll kill you, and you'll never have to remember this moment again. Azazel chuckles, and steps through the doorway, closing it behind him as you move somewhere that isn't right next to the heat of his body. For fuck's sake, you're three thousand years old, not a schoolgirl. Get a hold of yourself.

"Nice place," he says, looking around at the posters that scatter the walls. The very-much-lewd, very-much-including-Azazel posters you decorated the place with in Kalawarner's memory.

Nobody who has not been you in this moment has ever known true embarrassment.

"It's a little small," you say, because at this stage all you can do is pretend the last minute never happened, "but it's good enough for now."

"And how long might that 'for now' be?" Azazel asks, staring idly out the window. The sunlight frames his jaw like it exists to do nothing else. "Until you finish the mission you're supposed to be on in Kuoh?"

You don't flinch, but it's close. You owe—you owe Azazel many things. An answer to that question is the least of them. Even if it means explaining your failure. Failures. Mittelt and Dohnaseek and Kalawarner are dead because of you. Hell, _you_ were dead because of you. Your mouth opens and closes a few times, trying to frame the words you don't want to say, but the moment you're about to speak, so does Azazel.

"I'm sorry," he says, softly. "I know your friends are gone. I don't know what happened in that city, but something must have gone horribly wrong. I would have given you more time, but this told me you died – and then came back to life."

He's holding your Grigori pendant. Your suitcase remains unopened and untouched.

"I thought, perhaps, that you'd been reincarnated by Rias Gremory or Sona Sitri, but that," he gestures up and down your body, "is obviously wrong. I know, theoretically, how to mimic an Evil Piece and revive someone into a Fallen Angel instead of a Devil, but it wouldn't work on you for the same reason that function of the originals doesn't work on Devils. What _happened_ to you, Raynare?"

"...I did," you say. The words choke themselves past your lips, and you turn away to stare at the wall opposite. There are no tears. You won't shame yourself like that before this man. You _won't_. "I was what went horribly wrong. I am what happened to me. It's—it's my fault."

You start out haltingly, but slowly pick up speed, like the story is a boulder crashing down a mountain toward the wreck your life will become once you're finished. Hyoudou. Argento. Boosted Gear and Twilight Healing. Freed Sellzen. Death. Kyoto and rituals and you're sorry _you're so so sorry_ —

"Breathe, Raynare," Azazel says. His hand is warm on your shoulder. "It's okay."

Time passes.

You turn around. It takes a few blinks to clear your eyes, but eventually you manage to focus on Azazel's face. You don't know what to make of his half-quirked lips, or how the way he's looking at you makes you feel somewhere between seven and seventeen. Eventually, he speaks.

"Are you going to come home?"

"I can't."

 _Not like this._

"Sure I can't convince you?"

You're not. It doesn't show on your face, but Azazel sees it anyway.

"Don't worry," he says, "I won't try. But don't stay gone too long, Raynare. The Longinus have started reappearing. There are things moving in shadows I cannot see. Something is coming, and I don't think it's kind."

He grins like a crack of lightning. "Or maybe I'm just a paranoid old man, complaining about my creaky elbow and the rain it's telling me is on the way. Either way, I'm sure you'll be safe enough here in Kyoto."

Azazel falls backward into a chair that wasn't there before, and crosses his legs, cupping his chin in a hand. There's a story about him and a couple of Yasaka's cousins; looking at the way his calves press against his pants, you can't say you blame them at all. Heaven knows you would if given the chance.

Not the time.

"I disobeyed my orders." Your mouth leaks words like blood. "I lied to my superiors – to you. Three members of the Grigori are dead because of me. And I came back to life with a shard of God in my soul by a method even _you_ don't understand. Why are you letting me go?"

"Yes," he says. "You did almost everything wrong that you could have. Do not mistake my forbearance for approval, Raynare. At the end of the day, though, you died. The fact you are alive is a miracle. Perhaps a literal one. I'm sure philosophers and lawyers might argue that your survival invalidates any weight it had as a punishment, but I'm also sure it's never happened to them either.

"I won't force atonement on you. That's your decision, not mine, and it's far more genuine that way. If it helps, you can consider yourself banished from the Grigori until further notice. Just make sure to tell me ahead of time so I can give it to you.

"Besides, as curious as I am about your survival, I'm not going to cage you to satisfy my interest. Though I do want you to promise me to keep investigating it yourself, and make records of what you find – it'll make my own research easier when you _do_ come back."

He sounds very sure that you'll be returning.

You wish you felt the same.

"Thank you, my lord." What else is there to say? You'd bow, but Azazel hates obsequiousness.

"Well, since Baraqiel will be riding my ass about the paperwork if I don't get back soon, I think that's about everything," he says, and then holds up a hand. "No, wait, one last thing."

Azazel walks _straight up to the poster of him in the shower_ —Kalawarner bought it from Zaqiel, who refused to speak of how he got the photo in the first place—and taps his naked thigh with a finger. "That's not me, you know. Scar's in the wrong place."

You are not sure you'd recognise the expression on your face in a mirror.

"I'll see you round, Raynare. Stay safe," Azazel says, "and do better next time."

He starts walking away; on the third step, he vanishes in a flare of Light.

Hours later, when you finally realise you should get something to eat, you notice that the wards on your door have been restored – and improved, given the way they unfold when you turn the doorknob and lock behind you as you leave.


	17. Favours 3-1

Your estimates were right.

A little over twenty-four hours after Azazel's visit, you twist your Light into shadows and lies, and for the first time in three days it responds. Raven Black—Sabetha—replaces Raynare, and you are not yourself again. It feels thematically fitting.

This, of course, is merely a footnote in the recent events of your life. Like, say, _Azazel's visit_. The fact your soul healed stronger, and you can feel an ache in your back where your Light feels like it's straining to be free, is about as important to you right now as bicycles are to fish. You'll freak out over that once you finish freaking out over Azazel.

You don't remember much of the day after he left. There was a stumble in your step and wine on your breath when you decided you needed something to eat; there was a woodpecker in your skull and beer on your dress when you woke up a couple of hours ago. Total recall requires a functioning brain, after all. Unfortunately, that means you're still perfectly capable of remembering every last moment of your meeting with him.

A light-spear hums in your hand—as part of testing your returned strength—and you're not sure if the impulse to stab it through your skull comes from a desire to end your headache or your existence in general. He saw the posters. He saw _his_ poster. You swore you wouldn't cry. You did anyway. Pathetic. Weak. Did you mention pathetic?

You should have stood tall, reporting your failures with unwavering sincerity and discipline. You shouldn't have needed _comforting_ like some teenaged brat who'd just broken up with their first boyfriend. So what if your friends died? So what if you did? A real woman would have stayed strong – wouldn't have let her suffering show.

Hell, she wouldn't have suffered in the first place, because if there's one thing you know in this world, it's that caring is a mistake.

A shiver runs through your wings, but you ignore it. You're free, now, and you always will be.

You shake your head, whipping your hair hard enough to sting your skin. Back to the point. So you fucked up that conversation; when it comes to Azazel, that's nothing new. Odds are he doesn't think you're any less a piece of trash than he already did, because if it wasn't for his kindness he probably wouldn't even know your name. More important is what he told you—apart from the fact you're _not_ actually cast out from the Grigori, regardless of whether or not you deserve to come back—about what's coming.

Azazel has your unequivocal trust. Of course he does. You love him. If he's worried about the resurgence of Longinus bearers, if there are hidden powers moving in circles that concern even him, then they worry and concern you too. And if Kyoto is supposed to be safe enough, then it is in Kyoto you will stay until you're strong enough to matter.

(Whether the universe will let you is another question entirely).

Speaking of strength, you feel… _more_ , now. Your limbs aren't lighter, and your light-spears aren't sharper – it's just that your body seems restless, like little sparks of lightning are constantly arcing under your skin. The illusions you wear came no easier than they did a week ago, but the well you drew them from stretched deeper than ever before. Your soul healed stronger, and you suspect the blame—and perhaps, maybe, just possibly, the gratitude—can be placed at the feet of the shard of God in your soul, and the Light it was leaking when it burned itself into your mind.

It's fucked with your control some, but not as much as one might expect. You've had thousands of years to practice spinning your Light to express your will, and you don't forget how to ride just because you upgraded to a more powerful bike. At most, you might melt through a lock rather than twist it open, though just in case you won't be running any rituals without a couple day's more practice.

Hmm.

Well, they do say there's no time like the present.

You hold out a hand, and your Light forms a sphere. It's supposed to be perfect, and around the size of your heart – instead, it dissolves into static around the edges, and is roughly twice as large as it should be. That won't do. You fold your legs beneath you, slipping to the floor with a grace even a pole-dancer would envy, and close your eyes.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

It's an odd sensation, manipulating your Light this way; like trying to clench a fist you don't have. Your hands—your real ones—are warm beneath it. Both are nothing more than material distractions you ignore with centuries of ease. Not all your focus is on this single task – you're still concentrating on maintaining your illusions, because there's no point having a disguise only to drop it the moment you try to do something else.

Breathe in.

When the sun sets, the sphere has shrunk, but still flickers.

Breathe out.

When the sun rises, the sphere is as large as your fist and as smooth as your skin.

You smile.

Dismissing it with a flick of your wrist, you stand. Your powers have returned, your control is back, and you're hungry. It's time to brave the outside world again – without a full bottle of wine sloshing around in your stomach. That raises a different question, though: where should you go? Normally, the answer would be 'wherever you fucking feel like', but you're not sure if you want to be that carefree. Or careless.

Somewhere in this city is a group of sufficient power to arrange you the sort of ritual site you'd normally expect to spend months organising for – in three days. They have—most probably—an agent assigned to you, who may or may not actually even know that's what she's for. Whatever they want is something they'd prefer to bribe than threaten you for, at least so far. You're surprised they haven't come to find you yet. Maybe Azazel scared them off?

He's gone now, though, and that means you have a decision to make.


	18. Favours 3-2

Honestly, you might as well get this over with.

You can't use Azazel as a shield forever, and you don't want to. Most of your life has been spent under the aegis of someone—or something—greater than yourself. If you ever want to learn how to _be_ that someone, it won't start by waiting for opportunities to come to you. You know that from experience.

No. It's time to pay Ruri another visit.

You strip yourself with the ease of someone who does it for a living, and pulse the dirt and grime from your body with a flex of Light. In honour of Kyoto, you select one of the two yukata you own; they're annoyingly restrictive and complicated to put on, but sometimes the point of clothing is to be fun for other people to take off. Yukata, as it happens, make very good giftwrap.

Naturally, you tie the obi at the front.

Slipping Kalawarner's wallet into the bag that accompanies your outfit and checking your appearance in a mirror—flawless, as usual—you leave the apartment, locking the wards behind you. The next time you see Azazel, you need to thank him, even if to him the work would have been less time-consuming than a sneeze. You descend the stairs a little slower than usual, given you can't exactly stride in what you're wearing, and slip out the gate into Kyoto proper.

You remain unaccosted on your way to Restaurant Kiev. Physically, anyway. Kyoto's streets are quite busy, and they get a little busier with the minor accidents the sight of you in traditional Japanese dress causes along the way. The number of eyes you can feel on you wouldn't be out of place in that game Mittelt was so fond of. At least, you think she was fond of it; there was always an awful lot of shouting involved. Maybe you should pick it up at some point, just to see what it was that kept her coming back.

Soon enough, you arrive at the restaurant, and are spared the embarrassment of having come all this way for nothing by the sight of Ruri delivering a shoulder-high stack of plates at the back of the room. Excellent. The maître d' leads you once again to a table, and you see the moment Ruri notices you're there by the slightest hitch in her step. She doesn't react otherwise, and you smile the way other people do on seeing you naked. You're going to _enjoy_ this.

Another waitress approaches you—Ruri finished handing off the dishes and headed to another table, ignoring you entirely—and your glance into her eyes is accompanied by a thrust of Light. The compulsion is simple and easily weaved: go and serve someone else. You're not particularly patient when it comes to games like these, but if Ruri wants to play them, you're quite happy to – by cheating.

(You're a Fallen Angel. What did she expect?)

A second waitress is redirected before she gets within ten feet of you, and the only one left working the floor is Ruri herself. Ten minutes or so have passed since you arrived, and the maître d' has noticed how unattended your table is. But he's busy with a table of what look like very important guests, and the other two waitresses are occupied with serving or carrying food. It's rather impressive, the way he manages to signal to Ruri to visit your table without breaking conversation with a man as rotund as he is expensively-dressed.

She approaches, and you interrupt her just as she's about to greet you.

"Hey, Ruri," you say, letting your smile show off the luscious curve of your lips. "What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?"

It startles a laugh out of her before she remembers to frown.

"I'm not happy with you, Sabetha," she says, sniffing imperiously. "What do you want to eat?"

"Aside from the obvious?" you say, letting your eyes linger on Ruri before returning them to the menu. "I think I'll have the Kiev selection this time. No drink. I'm not quite thirsty yet."

"Stop doing that! I'm the one who's supposed to be seducing you!"

"Why? Did somebody put you up to it?" You pause _just_ long enough for any reaction to show. "Like a dare or something?"

"My sister bet me that I couldn't," Ruri says. As far as you can tell, she's entirely honest.

"The same sister who bought you the dress, I assume."

"You remember it?" Ruri seems oddly pleased; she's probably forgotten all Fallen have perfect recall. How amusing.

"How could I not?" you reply. "It features very prominently in my... memories of you."

You almost put the emphasis on 'prominently' instead, but her uniform is doing that for you.

"I am rather hungry, though," you continue, "so could you put my order in? Don't worry. I've made certain to save room for dessert."

"Mouuuu, Sabetha! You're not even trying anymore!" Ruri replies, apparently practiced enough at her job to scribble down your order even after the distraction of conversation. A glance at the pad tells you the language is actually Russian, not the Japanese she's speaking. "Where's the fun in that?"

"Don't be like that, Ruri," you say, wrapping your tongue around her name, "you'll make me think you don't _want_ to get to the fun part."

"I—I'll be back with your food." She turns and walks away without throwing a glance over her shoulder when you're not supposed to be looking. How interesting. Surely she must have practiced being seduced at some point. Where are the artful blushes? The side-eyed glances? In your professional opinion, she'd need to put in some extra work to get a passing grade at this stage.

(The only difference between the art of seduction and the art of being seduced is whose idea succumbing is supposed to be).

Of course, maybe that's the point. There's no better bait for a Fallen Angel than innocence. Some people—idiots, of course—might even claim Ruri is more beautiful than you, and the idea of having someone like her, so willing and so _vulnerable_ … well, just look where you are and what you're doing.

In the end, it hardly matters. If Ruri's sister has any sense—because if she's not something to do with this, you'll eat your wings—she won't interrupt until you're finished.

With everything.


	19. Favours 3-3

The hotel sheets are cool against your skin.

Ruri is splayed out beside you, both tails akimbo as she sleeps. Her chest brushes against your bare arm when she breathes, and her ears flicker like she's dreaming. You stare at the roof, too lazy and satiated to be bothered moving quite yet. For everything she lacked in experience, Ruri more than made up for it in enthusiasm and willingness to be… led.

She rolls over, away from you, and you take the chance to admire her body in motion. You would never admit it to her face—or anywhere else that might draw your attention—but Ruri really is beautiful. You lean up off the pillow almost unwillingly, resting an elbow in the warmth of where she used to lay, and stroke a gentle hand down the silken expanse of her back. On a morning like this, you might even entertain the thought that she's more beautiful than you.

You sit there for a while, amusing yourself by tracing whorls across her skin. Her ears twitch a couple of times when your fingers move somewhere particularly sensitive—the backs of her knees, the side of her waist—but you're careful not to wake her. You needed this. After everything that's happened over the past few weeks, it's nice to know that some things haven't changed.

Eventually, you draw yourself out of bed, padding across the floor to pull a bottle of water from the bar fridge. You scull it with a couple of quick gulps, a few drops of water slipping down your chin and further, and move to the small antechamber that leads into the bedroom. The chairs are as comfortable as you remember.

You've only spent half an hour or so sitting when the door clicks open. The woman who walks in—apart from being Ruri, only strawberry-blonde—is impeccably dressed in a suit-and-tie ensemble, finishing it off with a pair of black-framed glasses. She looks more professional than most professionals, and the image is only enhanced by the way she doesn't even bat an eyelash at the very naked Fallen Angel waiting for her with a bruised-lip smile.

(You _could_ have let yourself heal, but some things are meant to be savoured).

"Can you clean yourself up?" she asks, sounding like she just stepped out of Siberia as she sits down opposite you. "I'd rather not smell my sister on you while we're talking."

Your laugh, as you slowly rinse your skin with Light, is indulgent.

"My thanks," she says, short and sharp.

"I should be thanking you," you reply. "She was wonderful."

Her jaw tenses infinitesimally. How amusing. You're only calling it how it is.

"I thought it would prove a valuable learning experience for her. Getting your attention was, at best, a convenient side benefit."

"Well, you have it." You lean forward, and impressively her eyes remain on your face. "Though it'll take a little more work to earn my interest."

"I would have assumed the arrangements for your ritual had already done that," she says. "Or weren't you aware that was me?"

"Please," you say, "all that did was make me certain you wanted something in return. Or that _someone_ wanted something; I'll admit I wasn't sure the sister who 'even met Lady Yasaka once' dear Ruri name-dropped was the ringleader until you arrived."

Beneath your bones, your Light simmers. You might be outwardly blasé, but you're not inwardly stupid.

"Before I ask about that, though," you continue, "there's one other thing on my mind."

"Yes?" The question isn't at all impatient, but the way she occasionally taps away at the chair belies the truth. All business, this one.

"What are you?" You deliver the words the way other people deliver daggers.

To her credit, she doesn't react with anything except bemusement. "...a kitsune?"

"Oh, I know that much," you say, stretching languidly in your chair, "I did just fuck your sister, after all."

Again, a twitch of the jaw.

"But you're not _only_ kitsune. I wondered if Ruri's accent was an affectation for the restaurant – only she writes in Russian. Begs in it, too. Your voice sounds like they used it as the glue sticking the Iron Curtain together, but there's only one Kuma Lisa, and she isn't you. I don't think you're the hardcore otaku type—and Ruri certainly isn't—so the alternative is that the two of you lived there for quite a while, for some reason or another.

"Thing is, your sister's young. More importantly, she's _inexperienced_."

In the beginning, Ruri touched you like you were spun from glass; kissed you like she was scared of breaking skin. She held back as if eagerness could ruin you – the same way you did with your first few mortals, before you learned their limits and yours as well. No, you're quite sure Ruri has never had a supernatural lover before you.

You gesture over your shoulder, toward the bedroom where she rests.

"Looking like that, though? She sure as Hell shouldn't be. But kitsune are racist the same way the rest of Japan used to be, and I can just imagine how they might look down on a half-breed—a mongrel—no matter how lovely."

Ruri's sister raises an imperious eyebrow. No jaw-twitch this time. "Are you done?"

"Depends," you say, voice easy, "on whether I get my answer, or whether I have to start guessing."

"If it really matters, our mother was the kitsune," she replies evenly. "Our father was a perelesnyk. I make no secret of my heritage."

How interesting. Russian incubus genes would certainly explain a lot of things about Ruri.

"So the accent suggests," you say. "What's your name, by the way? I'm sure you know mine."

"Nabi. And yes, I know."

"Well, Nabi, what can I do for you?" You lean back, crossing one leg over the other, and regard her with a birdlike tilt of the head, propped up by a hand under your chin. "I'm still waiting to hear why I should be interested in you instead of your sister, you know."

She mutters something under her breath that sounds suspiciously like the Russian for 'fucking Fallen', and then looks you straight in the eye. Not that this is in any way unusual, given she hasn't glanced below your neck this entire conversation. It's almost insulting.

"I want you to extract a Sacred Gear for me."

 _Well then._

"What makes you think I can do that?"

"Don't insult me," Nabi replies coolly. "The first thing you did on coming to this city was book a ritual berth, and you merit a personal visit from Azazel. Of course you can."

Hmm. Does she think you're more important than you are? How convenient.

"Suppose, for argument's sake, that you're right. What makes you think I'm _going to?_ "

The ritual itself is probably not beyond any other faction's—not Faction, the Angels won't do it and the Devils don't need to—ability to create, but you've still never heard of someone else using it, and you're loathe to reveal the Grigori's secrets to anyone. That sort of behaviour starts with t, and ends with reason – specifically, the reason you get excommunicated or just plain executed. The only excuse would be if your actions somehow benefited your race.

"I am a part of Lady Yasaka's spiritual research division," Nabi says, "and she has recently requested that we turn our attention to the study of Sacred Gears. My colleagues have expressed their disinterest in my ideas and methods, but I still think they are worth pursuing – so I have decided to look elsewhere. There are no laws or policies against scientific collaboration, conveniently.

"An actual, raw Sacred Gear to investigate and experiment on—one not tied to anyone—would be something worth presenting to Lady Yasaka herself, let alone the potential findings from those investigations and experiments. I'm sure you can see the political benefits for your faction, and that's before any advances in understanding resulting from the collaboration!"


	20. Favours 3-4

You extend a hand.

"Lend me your phone, would you?"

Nabi blinks. "Sorry, what?"

"I didn't bring mine, and nobody dressed like you wouldn't have one."

"Why do you want it?" It's the most uncertain she's looked this entire conversation.

"I need to contact Lord Azazel, obviously," you reply. "I can't accept that sort of offer out of hand, y'know?"

A flicker of confusion across her face. Looks like you were right: she _does_ think you're more important than you are. It'd be amusing to embarrass her by revealing the depth of her folly – but best not to, in the end. The aegis of the Grigori is a useful tool, and one you'd prefer not to discard until you're mighty enough not to need it, if indeed you ever want to discard it at all.

You haven't quite figured that out yet.

"Very well," Nabi says, after a second or two of awkward silence, "here you go."

She plucks a phone from her pocket, and hands it to you.

"I'm sure you'll understand if I keep this private," you say, and she nods.

Your fingers flicker into a pattern that would leave most observers convinced they had moved through one another, and with a soft whisper of Light you erect a minor privacy illusion around you; the sort that blurs lips and muffles sound. It was mildly tempting to modify it to replace every word you spoke with one of Ruri's sighs instead, but that feels a little crude even for you.

You punch in a specific set of digits that aren't, in fact, part of Azazel's phone number, and it starts to dial. The Grigori have known stakes in several mortal and supernatural businesses around the world—and many more private investments that you're not going to reveal any connection to—and rather than give away Azazel's personal contact details to Nabi if she's careful enough to watch what you type, you're going to let one of them transfer your call instead.

"Red Bull Marketing Department, Mark speaking. How may I help you?"

"Put me through to Mr. Zel," you say. "Tell him it's Raynare, about the Japanese arrangement."

It feels almost strange to refer to yourself by your actual name, but the ward will protect it, and fuck using Jehiel instead.

"One moment, please."

The delay before you hear Azazel's voice is thankfully short.

"Raynare?" he asks. "Have you decided to return already?"

He sounds pleased, and you can't control the traitorous flutter of your heart even though you _know_ it's only because Azazel is professionally fond of all his subordinates and not because he cares for you in particular.

"Not yet, my lord," you say. It's easy to say you're unsure when it isn't Azazel asking, but you had to concentrate not to say yes. "I'm calling about something else; I was approached by a youkai—half-kitsune, half perelesnyk—who said she was part of Yasaka's spiritual research division. Apparently Yasaka's looking into Sacred Gears at the moment, and the youkai wants me to extract a Sacred Gear for her to study. Her name is Nabi, if that means anything to you."

"Oh? How interesting." His voice ripples down your spine. "I believe I've read a few of her papers on psychic chirurgy. She has some interesting insights."

"She seems to be working independently of the rest of the department, I suspect for the obvious reasons, and she implied that Yasaka would be very interested in the work she's planning. Enough to potentially get the Grigori an audience with Yasaka when presenting the findings," you continue. "Whether or not Nabi's exaggerating, I didn't feel comfortable accepting or rejecting an offer with those sorts of political implications on your behalf."

 _Especially given what happened the last time I made unilateral decisions_ , you do not say.

"You did well to bring this to me, Raynare," Azazel says. "Accept her offer on our behalf. I've a group in mind to handle it, but they won't be available for a couple of days, so if you have nothing pressing, could you fill in until then? Don't do anything about the ritual itself, but I imagine there are a few things Nabi needs to do first."

Oh.

Of course.

There's no way Azazel is going to let you handle this. You're the girl who fucked up her last assignment twice over, who doesn't have the power or the skill to be the face of the Grigori even for simple scientific collaboration, and who says herself that she isn't part of the Faction at the moment. Hell, just being allowed to fuck around until the real Fallen get here is really a reward for being a good girl and calling it in.

"Yes, my lord," you say. Your voice is perfectly steady; happy, even, as if there's nothing you'd love more than to be of service to him.

The worst part is that you're not entirely lying.

"Excellent," he says. "I'll contact you again when it's time to hand off the mission. Thank you, Raynare."

With that, he hangs up.

You lift the phone from your ear, swiping absently through settings to delete the call out of habit, and hand it back to Nabi as you dismiss the privacy ward.

"Excellent news!" you say, voice as bright as your smile and twice as much a lie. "Lord Azazel has decided to accept your offer, and a team of our best scientists will be here by the end of the week. Until then, you're stuck with me, but we can work on whatever needs doing that isn't the ritual itself."

"That's… good," she says, a touch too slowly for you to believe. "I am yet to secure the requisite Sacred Gear for my—our—experiments, and I would be glad for your assistance in capturing it."

"Oh?" A chance to stretch your legs would be nice, and Nabi probably won't stab you in the back during the process. She has no reason to.

"Yes. A priest of Omoikane, at a shrine in Kyoto's north, has recently manifested a Gear that is apparently called Apocalypse Menagerie. I do not yet know what it does, but it takes the form of a pouch, and the priest has been seen plucking ofuda out of it. It seems highly illogical that it's restricted to just Japanese talismans, but for all the certainty my informants can give me, he may just be using it as portable storage."

You made a careful study of Sacred Gears prior to your mission in Kuoh—though obviously not careful enough, given you couldn't tell the _Boosted Gear_ from a fucking _Twice Critical_ —and you've never heard of Apocalypse Menagerie, or indeed any Sacred Gear that manifests as a pouch. How… wonderful.

Normally you wouldn't want to get anywhere near an unknown Sacred Gear user, human or not, but this is the mission you have been entrusted by Azazel, and you _will not fail._

Part of not failing, however, is making sure Nabi isn't planning to set off a civil war in Kyoto.

"Are you sure it's, shall we say… advisable to be attacking a Shinto priest in the middle of a Shinto city? Kingdom of youkai or not, that sounds to me like a bad idea."

Nabi frowns at you, as if insulted. "I chose him very carefully. Lord Inari is unhappy with Omoikane at the moment, and has been for the past decade or so. I cannot profess to understand the reasons behind their feud—only someone like Lady Yasaka might know—but Lord Inari will welcome any blow struck against Omoikane, and shield us and this city from retribution. Two other shrines to Omoikane in Kyoto have already been forced to close by a string of rather unfortunate luck."

Huh.

"Fair enough. We should get together later tonight to plan this thing, or just plain get it done if I like the plan you inevitably already have enough. You know where my apartment is, I'm sure, so I'll meet you on the street out the front at nine?"

"I was intending to start as soon as possible," Nabi says, because of course she is.

"Well, far be it from me to interfere, but which do you think will go down better with Ruri: waking up to find her naked lover talking with her sister about attacking a priest in the name of science, or waking up to find that lover gone entirely without a word?"

And there's the resurgence of the jaw twitch.

You lean forward, voice low as if imparting some great secret. "I'll give you a hint: it's a trick question. Unless, of course, you _want_ to give her the impression that you bought me with her body. Which would probably be kinder to her self-esteem than the implication she's not even worth a goodbye."

You can't even call that a twitch. That's a straight-up spasm.

Straightening, you shrug with lazy insouciance. "But hey, what do I know?"

"You've made your point." Her tone is as flat as her expression. "I will be there at nine."

"Pleasure doing business with you," you reply.

 _And speaking of pleasure…_

Standing, you turn back toward the bedroom and toss a wave over your shoulder. "See you round, Nabi."

You're polite enough to wait until the door clicks open and shut before you start working on waking Ruri up.

Some time later, the foxgirl stretches out beside you, breathless. "Mmm… that was fun."

"Only fun?" You arch an eyebrow. "I feel insulted."

"I was trying not to inflate your ego," Ruri says. "I don't know if you noticed, but after last night, I can say for certain that it's rather impressive."

"Now I _am_ insulted." She's grinning, and you're tempted to show her exactly how well you can wipe it off – but you suspect that's probably the point. Silly Ruri. That's not how this works. "Mostly by that attempt to provoke me."

You pat her on the head, right between the ears. "Better luck next time."

Ruri pouts—it seems to be her trademarked expression—and bats your hand away. "I'm not a kid, Sabetha!"

"I have dresses older than you are, Ruri," you reply, voice rippling with laughter. "A little condescension is only to be expected."

"...really?"

"You're a two-tails," you say, stroking one—very fluffy—appendage by way of emphasis. Ruri shivers in response. "Not even two centuries old. I have a gown and accompanying hose tucked away that I wore to infiltrate King Arthur's court. The fashion back then was terrible, but it has sentimental value to me."

As a hybrid, she might age differently, but you're not supposed to know that.

"How old are you, then?" she asks softly. "I can certainly tell you're… experienced."

You suspect—based on your conversation with Nabi—that the hesitation is out of shame – just not shame about what the two of you have been doing.

"I don't know for certain," you reply, brushing her shoulder with your own as you shrug. "I'd need to consult Heaven's calendar to be sure, assuming they haven't scratched me out of it, and that's obviously a little difficult. I spent some number of years up there before setting foot on Earth for the first time, and that was around when humanity started playing around with iron properly. The best estimate I can give you is somewhere between three and three and a half thousand years."

Ruri blinks. " _Wow_. Doesn't that make you older than even Lord Inari? How come you only have two wings?"

Your hand clenches on her tail involuntarily, and she yelps before you force yourself to let go. "I predate most of the pantheons anyone can name, actually. A lot of Angels—Fallen or not—do. And like them, I'm stuck the way God made me."

Well, technically that's a lie, given what you've been discovering lately. But this is pillowtalk, not a day to share deep and impossible secrets.

"I'm surprised you don't know that," you continue. "Angels are fixed and perfect. Those are the principles that define our existence. Or are supposed to, anyway."

Ruri flushes. "I've never had much of a chance to learn things like that. There were more important things to study back in R—back home, and ever since we moved to Kyoto, my sister's been too busy to teach me."

"You didn't find another teacher, or do it yourself?"

"No," she says, very firmly. "I tried that. It didn't work."

You sense a story there.

Suddenly, Ruri brightens, almost launching herself up off the pillow as she twists her whole body to face you. It takes a while for your eyes to reach hers.

"I know! You could teach me!"

 _What._

"It'd be great! I bet you know all sorts of things about the supernatural world. I'll be a diligent student!" She leans down to whisper in your ear, and the rest of her body makes her proximity rather clear. "A _very_ diligent student."


	21. Favours 3-5

In the end, the decision is easy.

Passing up a chance to have a beautiful woman hang on to your every word, demonstrate the breadth and depth of your experience, and be rewarded in the process?

"Of course I'll teach you, Ruri," you say, kissing her smile away. Terribly sappy, but sometimes dignity must be sacrificed in the name of manipulation. "You've already proven that you're a very fast learner, after all."

You press her off you gently, and sit up.

"I can't start immediately; there are a few things I need to do over the coming days, but starting next week we should be able to pick out a convenient schedule for the both of us."

A convenient schedule for you is, of course, pretty much whenever, because once you're finished with Nabi you're not exactly doing anything else. You have vague plans for self-improvement; mostly setting up another ritual to continue studying your soul, and learning a lot more math and physics. Apart from that, however, your time is looking fairly empty. You can't work _all_ day every day, you'd go insane.

Ruri doesn't need to know that, though. As far as she's concerned, you are offering her a great privilege. And you are. She should be _honoured_ to receive your instruction.

"Oh? What are you doing?"

"Nothing you should worry your pretty little head about," you say, and smirk at her infuriated expression. "Really, I'm serious. Just some research for Lord Azazel."

The best sort of lie, after all, is the one that is entirely true.

"Secret Faction business," Ruri says, sighing slightly, "yeah, I get it."

"Well, that's one less element of supernatural etiquette I'll have to teach you."

"Hey! I'm not that dumb!"

"What?" you ask. The expression on your face would make innocence look like it had just been caught _in flagrante delicto_ by comparison. "As your teacher, I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't find out what my adorable student needed to learn."

Ruri pokes you in the side. "Don't be mean."

You roll over her abruptly, hands pressing into the sheets just above her shoulders on either side of her head. Your hips settle above hers, and you lean down in a mirror of her earlier position.

"Are you saying you don't like it?" you ask, breath whispering across her skin. She doesn't blush – but she doesn't deny it either. "I thought not."

You lift yourself off her, not bothering to hide the satisfaction in your smile.

"I have to go soon," you say, "and you probably have to get to work, right?"

The dawning horror on her face is hilarious. "Oh no. What's the time?"

There's a clock on the bedside table next to you. It says it's seven o'clock. When you repeat that to Ruri, she almost trips off the edge of the bed as the sheets threaten to tangle around her in her haste to get up. You're quite happy to sit back as she rushes around; hate to see them go and love to watch them leave, indeed.

"Sorry I've got to go I really enjoyed this I'll see you later bye!"

Her delivery is fast enough to make a machine-gun jealous, and the speed at which she runs out the door would make a bullet feel similarly.

Idly, you wonder if you should tell her she left her clothes behind.

Eh, she's a kitsune. She has illusions. It'll be fine.

And speaking of kitsune, you've got another to meet later today. Ideally, you want to get the capture done, not just the battle-plan, and that means you have your own preparations to make. You weren't capable of it back in Kuoh—too little raw power and never enough need until it was too late—but between the ambience of Kyoto's leylines and your own, more vibrant soul, you think you might be able to construct a quick ritual that will help in a fight like the one you're heading into.

(For all you know, Nabi has some clever idea based on situational knowledge you aren't aware of that will mean there won't be a fight after all. You hope not. You've wanted to kill something since you let Freed Sellzen go, but you'll take beating some uppity Shinto priest with a Gear he doesn't deserve to a pulp if you have to).

You decide on Ava's Demon. Invented, unsurprisingly, by a woman called Ava—apparently in response to the actions of a Devil—it fortifies the soul against spiritual possession, and to a lesser degree spiritual damage. At least for a time. The Shinto are big fans of using spirits, so it'll surely come in handy.

Luckily, you have the necessary supplies in your ritual kit—though you are running low on silver dust; probably want to do something about that at some stage—so by the time Nabi arrives, you've just finished casting it. You can see her out your window on the street below, and when she glances up directly at your apartment, you wave. She looks unimpressed.

How unfortunate.

You dress yourself in something loose and easy to move in, and lock up the apartment as you leave. Soon enough you're on the street, leaning against a lamppost and studying Nabi; she's wearing the same suit as she was in the morning, as freshly-pressed now as it was then.

"So," you say, "what's the plan? I don't know anything about where this guy is, and neither of us know what his Gear does – but like I said before, you don't strike me as the sort of person who decides to kill on a whim."

"The priest lives at the temple, which is surrounded on three sides by apartments, and a small park on the fourth. He is the only one there at night. Inevitably it will be protected by wards as well as whatever spirits he's summoned to help handle the upkeep of the shrine. I was intending for you to disable the wards during the witching hour so that I could sneak in past the spirits and take care of the priest while it's still dark. Can you do that?"

"Depending on how extensive they are, maybe," you demur, "and I can't guarantee any alarms won't go off in the process. Are you sure—human or not—that you really want to tangle with an unknown Sacred Gear wielder alone?"

"Do you have another suggestion?"


	22. Favours 3-6

"No," you say, "just checking. Shall we get going?"

"Very well. This way."

You follow Nabi through the city, and thankfully she doesn't lead you down any dark, murderous alleyways or into any ambushes. Instead, she takes you straight to the temple; the journey takes almost an hour, given how far away it is from your apartment, but it's not exactly a difficult walk. The two of you stop a fair distance from the park, and Nabi turns to you.

"I will find my own approach from here; I'd appreciate it if you could disable as many wards as you can. I'll be infiltrating at two o'clock."

That gives you four hours to make her entrance as easy as possible. Boring, but better she takes the risk than you – both the physical one, and the potential political blowback if this fails.

"Sure," you say, tossing her a wave as you look for somewhere to start work, "have fun."

Out of the corner of your eye, you see Nabi nod, and then she disappears, leaving the street empty except for you and an eclectic collection of parked cars. Hmm. That gives you an idea.

You approach the nearest model with tinted windows, and the door clicks open under the caress of your Light. The fact unlocking spells are more conceptual than literal is a rather convenient boon in an age where most locks don't fit the same definition they did a thousand years prior. You slip in, leaving the door open, and fiddle with the leather seats until they recline back as far as they can. If you're going to do someone else's work, you're damn well going to be comfortable in the process.

Closing your eyes, you breathe out, and let the Light in. You feel the temple's presence as a cold, clever thing, like a puzzle forged from metal. You can't find the wards, not individually—you're no sage—but you run your metaphorical fingers through the grooves and ridges, softer than breathing. The ephemeral edge of the temple feels… heavier, for want of a better word, near where it brushes up against what your memory tells you is the apartment block to its left.

You open your eyes and lean forward, chanting a couple of words to feed a spark of lightning—smaller than some you've seen Baraqiel sneeze—into the dashboard navigation system. It flickers on for a second or so, just long enough for you to check the time. Half-past-ten. Still plenty of time to get _something_ done, at least, now that you know where to start.

You close the car door behind you, and take a circuitous route well on the outskirts of any potential ward line that brings you to the roof of the leftmost apartment block. The brief moment of flight at the end is an exhilaration of rushing air and freedom, and your first few steps to the edge looking out over the temple are regretful. Why didn't you just offer to dive-bomb it until the priest came out?

You cast a spell to attune your eyes to sorcery, and blink.

Maybe that's why.

You see the wards—the thickest cluster nearby, just like you felt—as the afterimages they bleed into this plane, dripping over the temple and its surrounds like a monstrous web. Each tangles into the next, and any attacker would find themselves singing their presence with every step like a fly resting their feet on the spider's silk. Summoning traps have gone out of fashion nowadays, mostly eclipsed by less specialised protections, but apparently the priest decided to make up the deficit by himself.

In short, it looks like the sort of ward array made by someone who knows they're not welcome in Kyoto. Your kingdom for incompetent enemies.

Well, you can't exactly leave Nabi to run into it alone, and she clearly has no idea how these sorts of operations are run because she never bothered to give you a way to contact her in emergencies while she went dark. Nothing to it but trying, then.

Weakening a ward schema is like unpicking stitches – with a needle you had to search a haystack for. The doing isn't the hard part, it's the figuring out where the fuck to start. You're only seeing half the picture to begin with, because no doubt there are plenty of concealed alarms and traps that you can't see by putting on the magical equivalent of glasses. At least you've enough experience with _setting up_ defensive arrays that you can vaguely guess which gaps are probably hiding what.

There are a few general-purpose anti-ward spells you could use to divine an entry point, but almost all of them were invented in the past five hundred years or so, which means the sort of person who set up an array like this has probably heard of them. You need to be a little more obscure than that. It's tempting to go for poetic irony, and summon something of your own to help out, but that seems like a colossally arrogant idea even for you. Human or not, a Shinto priest posted to Kyoto with a Sacred Gear that likely has _something_ to do with summoning, and enough sense to set up a ward schema like this, is not the best person to get into a spirit-based pissing contest with. Ava's Demon will help defend you from the consequences of failure, but you're not a fan of failing in the first place.

No: you have something better in mind.

Nabi asked you to disable the wards, but that's not actually what you're here to do. Your task, fundamentally, is to _get her inside without being noticed_. Disabling them would do that, yes, but you're not bound by the method, only the results. Picking apart this many wards would take more time and—maybe, just possibly—skill than you have, so you're not going to.

Instead, it's time to do what Fallen Angels do best.

Lie.

You start to sing, slowly, softly, in a language that seems to sidle past hearing, each syllable lingering like the half-faded memories of a dream. Your Light seeps from your soul and slips into the wardspace, and you step back from the edge so as not to give your presence away through the sakura shimmer around your hands. The Moon drifts across the sky as you weave a cloak around the temple's wards. It's a thin, threadbare thing – the sort that belongs to someone beneath worth. Beneath notice.

 _Don't look_ , that cloak says. _Don't see._

 _There is nothing here for you to fear._

You don't know how much time has passed when you stitch the final, wayward thread of Light around where you think the last alarm might be hidden. A glance at the sky—and the position and face of the Moon—tells you it's closer to two o'clock than one. Nearly time for Nabi to move in; if she's anywhere near as good at illusions as kitsune should be, then between her disguise and your own efforts, she should be able to slip in and out unseen.

Nothing more for you to do than keep watch, and swoop in if she needs any help.

You sit on the lip of the roof, feet dangling, and wait.

Suddenly, there's a splintering crash from below, accompanied by something that sounds like somebody had bottled a thunderclap and just smashed the glass. Nabi—five tails whipping through the air to deflect splinters and spears in equal measure, and a man slung over her shoulder—sails in a surprisingly neat arc from the gaping hole in the temple's roof to land in the park, feet skidding furrows through the grass. Two tengu soar out after her – one screams like the eagle whose face it bears, and a horde of spirits hurl themselves from the awakened summoning traps toward Nabi. She slashes a hand through the air, and a wave of foxfire as bright as amethysts scatters them before her. Unfortunately, that leaves her open to the second tengu diving at her from above, and she has to throw herself into an maladroit somersault weighed down by the priest hanging limply in one arm to avoid losing the other.

Tengu aren't particularly mighty, but their entire society is focused on fighting, and they won't give up unless crushed in battle. Sometimes not even then. A five-tails like Nabi could take two in open combat, theoretically, but carrying the priest is slowing her down and restricting her in both defence and offence.

Looks like you might have to step in.


	23. Favours 3-7

You have height, opportunity, and surprise.

 _Whatever_ shall you do with it?

Light pools in your fingers, as bright as a sunrise; though, given the colour, perhaps the comparison would be more fitting to the vibrant dawn that sunrise heralds. Your spears tremble in your grip, whining with repressed power like you're taking a saw to the sky. Each is an edge of your soul, sharp and honed to killing.

You track the tengu through the air; they are little more than dark shadows across darkened ground, but it will take more than that to hide from something like you. Nabi is a spiralling blaze of gem-bright foxfire and lashing tails, kicking out a slash of flame to evaporate a second wave of spirits and force one tengu away – but the second falls like a blade toward her exposed back.

 _Not today_.

Your spear is a streak of starlight against the night, punching straight through the tengu's wing. It screams in pain and fury, no longer flying so much as falling, and Nabi whirls, almost dislodging the priest as she slams a boot into its jaw. You can hear the brutality of the impact from here. The tengu smashes into the ground hard enough to leave a dent, and Nabi sets it alight with a coruscating burst of foxfire.

The other might have ordinarily taken advantage of the distraction, had you not hurled your second spear directly at its chest. It spirals out of the way in a dodge less about grace than efficiency, and lifts its face toward you.

"Coward!" it howls, high and harsh. "Destroy her!"

Spirits—fucking Hell, how many of those things _are_ there?—soar toward you in a hissing swarm. Irritating. Your spears are by their very nature specialised for single targets, but not when there are a thousand of them. You throw a couple as you think, burning smoking holes in the spirit-swarm. The gaps close as soon as they appear.

In the end, you sigh. You could try to banish them, but again, a spiritual pissing contest on Japanese soil against the work of a Japanese priest on sacred ground. Not the best idea. Elementalism isn't your forte, and you don't have time to set up a ward of your own. Layering an illusion on the roof won't stop the charge from hitting you, and running while invisible from a bunch of fucking _lawn spirits_ or whatever the Hell these are is as shameful as it is unthinkable.

Two more spears snap into your hands with a crack like shattering ice.

The first, trailing edge of the swarm runs into a whirling wall of Light. Each spear blurs in your hands until it looks like you're holding hurricanes, and their searing edges scatter the spirits before you. You deflect a darting dive by slapping it away with a wing, and miss a second until the very last moment. An ungainly twist leaves them slicing open your shirt and bruising your hip rather than knocking the wind out of you; the subtle shimmer of your skin and lack of bloody furrows across it evidence of Ava's Demon at work. You flare both wings to clear space around your body, and curse.

This isn't working. You're a thief, a spy, a seductress. You're not made–figuratively or literally—for fighting so many things so beneath your notice at once. It's _infuriating_. For God's sake, a single lock of your hair is more glorious than these spirits will ever be, but that doesn't matter if you can't fucking hit them. You need more power. You need…

Oh. Of course.

Your soul is too large for your body. You saw that in the ritual room, only days ago.

Why don't you just let it out?

Light blooms in your veins, suffusing every inch of your form until it feels as if you're made of starlight and fury. You inhale summer and ozone, and hear the air tremble like the surface of a drum. The swarm lashes out at you from above, from below, from the side, but it doesn't matter; your mind is the space between thunder and lightning.

You exhale.

 _Let there be Light._

Your soul detonates.

Light screams from your skin like you are the centre of a solar flare. You blink away fading, pink afterimages to see half the roof is charred blacker than your wings, and the floor directly beneath you glows with heat. Everything smells like smoke; of the swarm, nothing remains. You look at your hands – still the burnished cream of Raven Black and Sabetha rather than the pale ivory of Raynare. Control, it seems, is everything.

A beat of your wings takes you off the ground before it melts your skin to your bones, and you look down at the park. One tengu is still embedded in the grass with a hole in its wing while on fire, but in a different position to before – you're guessing it got up and Nabi put it straight back down. The other—the one who called the spirits—is thrusting at her with a spear (well, naginata, but whatever) until it has to throw itself back to avoid a scorching jet of foxfire.

Your own spear transfixes its foot to the ground. Not where you were aiming, but good enough. Nabi takes the opening with another blast of flame, and the tengu is still howling with pain when your second throw embeds itself in its back. It staggers, dropping to a knee, which is why your third attack misses as it sails over its head and stabs into the ground right before Nabi.

Oops.

Her hands catch fire, and she plucks your spear out of the grass before stabbing it into the tengu's throat.

Well, damn. She's savage for a scientist.

You step off the edge of the roof, and fall. Against your skin, the wind is as soft and exultant as kissing.

Halfway down the building, a flex of your wings spirals you to the side in complete defiance to gravity and inertia, and you soar around the edge of the ward-line to land a metre or so away from Nabi. The priest still hangs from one of her shoulders, but the other bleeds from a wicked-looking cut as wide as her wrist.

"I'm impressed you kept him under the whole time," you say, because you honestly are. Most sorcerers and priests—of any religion—have better magic resistance than ordinary humans, and Sacred Gear wielders are usually even stronger. Sending someone who's both to sleep deeply enough to not wake through a full-on fight is worth a compliment, however mild. "What spell did you use?"

"I drugged him," comes the reply.

You blink.

 _Huh_.

"Well, anyway," you say as if the last five seconds never happened, "I assume it's going to keep him down until we've got him locked up?"

"I calculated the dose precisely." She sounds like you just asked her if the sky was blue.

"Naturally."

A thought crosses your mind. Nabi is injured and unsuspecting. You are fresh and stronger than experience would tell her. There's a Sacred Gear wielder, already procured, already unconscious, flopping in her grip. No doubt she has somewhere else to lead you after this – you could wait for her to turn around, stab a spear or two in her back, grab the priest off her, and then make it look like she fell to the second tengu and you avenged her.

If she's as isolated as it sounds, she won't have told anyone else about what she came here to do. Nobody knows but you. Not even Azazel; he asked you to help Nabi, but she only gave you the specifics afterward. You won't have failed the assignment, either; you were never supposed to keep her alive, just act as a gopher. She planned this mission, ran into more trouble than she expected, you did your best – but you're not really a frontline combatant, and you couldn't save her.

Azazel would understand. You're _supposed_ to be weak and small, after all.

You're not sure how many people would miss Nabi, or bother to investigate her death beyond the obvious, apart from Ruri. Dear, naïve Ruri, who you've already run circles around thrice before. You might have to leave Kyoto, just to be safe, but you'll have a Sacred Gear after you extract it—something you can do without the assistance of a leyline—and you might even be able to drag Ruri with you. She won't suspect a thing.

You have a feeling, based on Nabi's phrasing, that their parents are no longer around. Perhaps that's part of the reason they came to Kyoto. Surely Ruri wouldn't want to stay in a city that holds nothing but grief.

So much potential at your fingertips, and all you have to do is betray someone you don't even care about.


	24. Favours 3-8

You _could_ betray Nabi.

But it'd be pretty fucking stupid.

You don't know what the priest's Gear even does, you don't know how it'll interact with your soul, you don't know if Nabi has a lover who'll want to hunt her killer down, you don't know if Ruri will one day find out and betray you in turn—assuming you keep her around—and you won't be able to hide the truth from Azazel forever.

(There's a part of you that remembers what happened the last time you acted on this sort of impulse, too, and how instead of ending well it ended _you_ ).

"Nice trick with the spear," you say instead. "Though the last guy I saw do something similar didn't bother to shield his hands first. I hope he still has the burns. But anyway. Where to now? Unless you're going to surprise me by saying you don't have somewhere to stash him."

"I do," she replies, "but we don't need to leave to reach it."

Nabi reaches into the inside pocket of her suit jacket, and pulls out a scroll. It looks a little too large not to have revealed itself as a slight bulge in the fabric, but then again it was probably overshadowed by two other, not-so-slight bulges. Sometimes, it's hard to tell that Ruri and Nabi are related – and by sometimes, you mean when you're not looking at one of them. Out of that scroll, she pulls one about six times the size, and stretches it out on the grass beneath her.

As she drops the priest head-first into the second scroll and he disappears, you raise an eyebrow, amused. The glyphs that shimmer across its surface are easy enough to read; circles of stasis and binding and sealing. Maybe rather than killing Hyoudou, you should have shoved him in a scroll with a couple of summoned morgen to keep him entertained and brought him to Azazel. Assuming Mittelt could have made you such a thing. You're not exactly sure about the complexities of sealing, beyond the fact it's fucking difficult and requires ridiculous amounts of preparation to get right.

Given what you've seen of Nabi, she seems like a natural fit for the art.

"You've been planning this for a while, I see," you say.

"Months," she replies. "Thank you for your assistance."

"You're welcome."

The tengu off to the side—the one without a light-spear in its throat—is stirring feebly, and a lazy throw solves both problems at once. Nabi doesn't react, busy plucking her scroll from the ground and rolling it up. Rather than shoving it back in the smaller scroll, she pulls out a length of cord from another pocket and ties it up. Somewhere in the process, her tails disappear along with the furrier pair of her ears.

"I suppose I should offer to help with the clean-up," you continue, sounding about as thrilled as a student about to receive homework, and for roughly the same reasons. "Unless you plan on leaving things like this to send a message to Omoikane."

"Lord Inari would appreciate that," she says, as if the thought is a new one. How interesting. "Yes, we might as well. I'll get rid of the tengu so the mortals don't find them. There's no need to wait around until I'm done."

You've seen rocks with more subtlety than that dismissal – and they weren't as blunt, either.

"Will you need me for anything else before the delegation arrives?" you ask. You doubt it, but best to cover all your bases. Azazel is a fan of due diligence in his subordinates.

"I don't believe so," Nabi says, shaking her head. The motion dislodges some of the blood slowly coagulating on her shoulder, and it starts slipping down to stain more of her suit. "There's little left to do now that I have the Gear ready for extraction. I'll contact you later when I've made rearrangements for the ritual, so you can direct your… friends."

"Sounds good." Less work for you is always welcome. "One last thing before I go, though."

"Yes?"

"Ruri asked me to teach her about the supernatural world. She made a very… persuasive offer, too. Naturally, I accepted. "

You smile the same way another person might draw a blade.

"You should be proud: you didn't even have to ask her to whore herself out this time."

There's no jaw-twitch this time. Instead, one of Nabi's hands curls into a fist, and you inhale the harsh tang of smoke. As you expected; fresh off a fight and with no Ruri to keep secrets from, she's running more hot than cold. Both figuratively and literally. Good. There's no point playing with Ruri if her sister is going to smash the board, and the only way you'll be able to predict what it'll take to make her snap is if you see it for yourself.

"I know what you're trying to do," Nabi says, like that means anything when it's obvious you've halfway succeeded already. "Ruri is my sister, but I don't own her or her decisions. You can imply whatever you like and it won't change the truth."

"Just calling it how I see it," you reply, shrugging indolently. "I only wanted to tell you so you wouldn't come crashing in insisting that I stop corrupting her or something. If she doesn't know what she's signed up for, well, she'll learn. From me, that is – she said you've never been around to teach her anything."

"No." Nabi's voice is soft – the same way a knife to the throat is soft. "I haven't, because I've been too busy _keeping us alive_. She knows that. Just like I know what you want out of her. Teach Ruri well. Fuck her better. Give her those small moments of joy that keep her coming back for more; that's the way your people work, right? The road to ruin is paved with a good time, or however that saying goes.

"But when you tire of her—abandon her to the side like the trash you pretend I am—make sure it _hurts_. The more she cries from her mistakes now, the less she'll bleed for them later."

Every word twists a scowl of disgust from her lips, but she says them anyway. Nabi crosses the distance between you, and you let her press a finger between your breasts. Her touch is an open flame against your skin, even through your shirt. How amusing.

"Something like you can't possibly comprehend how much I love my sister. I 'sent' her to you because I will never be able to bring myself to break her innocence before this city does, and at least this way those _fucking_ kitsune or their—hah—lapdogs won't get the satisfaction."

Nabi's smile is bitter, like a doctor forced into triage. She drops her hand, and moves over to one of the tengu. Fire flares between her fingers, and she presses it against the youkai's body.

"You can go," she says over her shoulder.

"If that's the way you love," you say to her back, "I don't want to see the way you hate."

Nabi's laugh reminds you of breaking bone. "Too late for that."

You turn and walk away.

 _What an interesting girl._


	25. Learning 4-1

It was tempting, briefly, to dress like a sexy librarian.

Common sense prevailed, however; if you're going to be teaching Ruri the way the world works, you should probably lead by example. The people you have to watch out for aren't the ones who look like they're trying, be it to stand out or anything else. Well, except the Leviathan, but when you're capable of disintegrating an island _without_ trying you get a little leeway.

Point is, you're wearing a short, comfortable dress you resized from Kalawarner's collection instead as you lounge in a chair at one of Kyoto's many libraries. It's been a few days since you last saw Nabi, and a visit to Ruri's restaurant let you organise times to meet her: twice every week, on her days off. The idea of a kitsune being beholden to a mortal job is the amusing sort of pathetic, but you suppose it might be the best she can get her hands on for now. You should teach her to steal. Start her off with petty thievery to warm her up to the _real_ kind. They say crime doesn't pay, but that's because the ones that do aren't committed by people stupid enough to admit it.

(The idea of selling her on selling herself is one you shoot down fairly quickly. You don't think Nabi would appreciate the joke, no matter how much she professed to respect Ruri's independence).

You pass the time before Ruri's due to arrive by scratching a privacy ward to the bottom of the desk. It's a simple thing—much like the desk itself, plain brown wood and just enough space for two—designed to make your voices uninteresting and you unapproachable. If you're going to lecture on the supernatural, you'd rather not do it in a whisper. Or have some mousey mortal try to tell you off for being too loud, either.

Unfortunately, it'd take a little more work than you're interested in to make the type of ward that'd let you be the _other_ sort of loud without getting kicked out or arrested – and as fun as that can be, Ruri probably isn't ready for it yet. Seduction—of the mind, not the body—is best done so slowly the victim never has a thought they can't claim as their own, and she's much too lovely to lose to impatient hedonism.

To power up the ward, you press a quick burst of Light into its activation matrix. Literally so, in fact; you've spent most of the past few days and nights as much on reading mathematics textbooks as you have on redesigning old rituals. It makes the most sense to start with the simple ones, and you already knew privacy wards relied as much on probability as they did mind-control. You still don't exactly _get_ Markov chains, but you can pretend well enough for something this basic – even if it fails, you've spent so little strength on it that at worst the desk might become hot to the touch.

Out of the corner of your eye, you spot Ruri's entrance by the way heads turn and one teenager's jaw slacks. She's wearing a kimono—for a given value of kimono, and a given value of wearing—and has even included an obi. How kind of her to return the favour.

She crosses the room toward you, and you shove out her chair with your foot.

"Hey, Sabetha!" she says, not so much slipping as slinking into her seat. The motion exposes a couple of things about how much clothing she's wearing beneath that kimono, and you sigh internally. Really? Looks like you know what your first lesson is going to be about. There's a difference between lascivious and desperate, and you don't particularly enjoy the latter – not when it comes to sex, anyway. You'll draw out a death just to watch a man weep, but in the bedroom the only sort of begging you want to hear is for more.

"Hey, Ruri," you say. "Want to guess what you'll be learning today?"

"Uh…" The quizzical crinkle of her nose is—just possibly—something that maybe other people might perhaps think of as adorable. Not you, of course. "The history of the Grigori?"

The slyness of her smile suggests she's thinking some sort of joke at your expense.

"No," you reply, voice perfectly level. "I'm going to teach you an ancient and fundamental secret of society, one so deep and mysterious your life will never be the same afterward."

Her eyes widen eagerly.

"Tell me, dear Ruri… have you heard of _underwear?_ "

You can't help it; her expression—more scandalised than a friar invited to an orgy at a convent—sends you into peals of laughter. Your mirth is such that you have to hook a foot around one of the desk's legs to stop yourself from falling entirely out of your chair. The privacy ward has to be working for you not to have been confronted.

" _Sabetha!_ " she hisses. "That was _mean_."

"Good." The words slip out around your chuckles. "You're learning."

You straighten, setting your chair back against the floor.

"Listen, Ruri," you say, looking her straight in the eyes, "you seem to have the wrong idea about this arrangement. I might be a Fallen Angel, but I didn't agree to teach you just because I wanted to keep fucking you. Let's be honest with ourselves here: if I'd refused, and still turned up at your restaurant tomorrow, would you have said no?"

She glances away. You reach over, and tilt her face up by her cheek. She doesn't resist.

"It's not your fault. Most people never get a chance at someone like me, and you seem more deprived than most. If I were in your shoes, I'd be honoured."

"No you wouldn't," she says. "That's what you'd tell _them_."

It startles a laugh out of you, and your hand drops away. "You're cute when you're cheeky. My point is that you don't need to turn up in half a kimono and nothing underneath in order to keep my attention. You have a lot to learn before you're ready to deal with the sort of people who take advantage of—or want—desperation like that."

"What if I _want_ to dress like this?" she asks; the challenging thrust of her jaw would shame a swordsman.

You shrug. "Then by all means, go ahead. I'd be a _little_ bit of a hypocrite to try and deny you freedom of expression. But I saw the way you glanced around the room when you arrived, and trust me; I know the difference between nervous thrill and nervous discomfort."

Ruri droops a little in her chair, like a plant consigned to shade. "Yeah, you're right."

"Of course I am," you say, because, well, _of course you are_.

She huffs, amused. "Seriously, though, I'm young, but I'm not entirely naïve. What else do you want from me? Fallen Angels don't do things out of the kindness of their hearts. Even I know that much."

You mind flits—as it so often does—to Azazel. "You'd be surprised."

 _Just not about me_.

"Consider this your first test," you continue. "Figuring out why I agreed."

"How is that related to expanding my supernatural education?"

Your smile would make a shark jealous. "The first truth about a world of gods and monsters is this: when you regard it, you see what others have chosen for you to see. The first _lesson_ is to realise that this is a gift. If everything you see—everything you have ever seen—exists because someone allowed it, then it was allowed for a reason. It exists because something desires it to keep existing. Understand that desire, and you can guess at motivation. Guess at motivation, and you begin to comprehend the one it motivates.

"Comprehend the architect, and reality itself unfolds like the petals of a flower."

Ruri cocks her head to the side. "That sounds like something from a book."

"Maybe it is," you say. "Point is, to figure out the right way to treat a member of the Winter Court as opposed to a Valkyrie, you need to _know_ them. I'm not particularly unusual for a Fallen Angel, so if you want to learn what to do and how to act when you meet another, pay attention."

"Yes, teacher!" She nods firmly.

"Good girl." Ah, there's the pout again. "More seriously, I don't have a list of what you have and haven't been taught about the way things work, so I figured I'd open it up to you. What do you want to learn about first?"


	26. Learning 4-2

**If it is necessary to mention, the opinion of a character does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the author.**

* * *

"The Devils. The Church had a big presence back—I mean, I'm familiar with them, and Heaven as a result, plus it'd be cheating to ask you about the Grigori, so that only leaves them."

Hah. Devils?

You can talk all day about _Devils_.

First, though, you'd best get something else out of the way.

"The Orthodox Church, right?" you ask, and she freezes. "What? Of course you've spent time in East Europe. In Russia. I can hear the traces of your accent, and it's the language you spoke when I was doing my best to make sure you couldn't speak at all. You're so young I'd even hazard a guess that you were born there, with that in mind."

"How'd you know?" The words slip out like tears.

You cock your head to the side, as if confused. "I just told you, silly girl. I don't know why it so concerns you, but as long as it isn't Hell, Heaven, or some squalling mortal's legs, I don't care in the slightest about where you come from. I just wanted to make sure I had the right one, because each branch of the Church have their own doctrines and interpretations, and they're usually wrong about _something_."

Ruri's smile is tremulous, like sunlight peeking through a storm. "Well, obviously: there's more than one god, in three persons or not."

"Yeah, they fucked that up too. God was only ever singular, even if He wasn't the only deity around."

You've always thought it a little silly that there are so many variants of a single theology, but then again ones like those in Russia generally rose after the Great War. With God dead, and Michael pulling Heaven back to recover, there was nobody to tell them they were distorting the truth – or, at least, nobody with sufficient spiritual authority to make them listen.

"Anyway," you continue, "we're not here to talk about Heaven."

You set both palms on the table, and stare Ruri in the eye. "The first thing you should probably know is that of all the things in this world I hate, Devils rank third. Most Fallen dislike them. Some might despise them. But to those of us who were once Angels, they are _anathema_. Both figurative and literal. Looking at a Devil hurts my soul, and I am not speaking in metaphor.

"I'll save the history lesson for another time, however. It isn't really going to be of use to you when it comes to interacting with them, especially since most of the newer Devils like to pretend the Morningstar never existed. Instead, I want you to remember this: whenever you meet a Devil, even if they just catch your eye from across the street, _they want something_. They are born of avarice and envy.

"There's no such thing as a kind Devil." You pause. "Well, no, that's not quite correct. I'm sure they're kind to each other. Some are even kind to their slaves. But they will never be kind to _you_ unless they think it'll make it easier to get what they want. A long time ago, that would have been your soul. But those days are in the past! They've caught up with the times. Become respectable."

When you laugh, there is no mirth in it.

"Fucking _bullshit_. The greatest lie the Devils ever told is that they're just like the rest of us. No, they don't want to steal your soul – they want to _cage it_. They'll start out small, with little gifts for little favours, all those pretty prissy contracts they strut around with. Just sign on the dotted line, all nice and civilised. Then they'll ask you for more. But of course they'll give the same in return, because otherwise it'd be unfair. Just how society works, right?

"One stone here. One stone there. And before you know it the whole fucking avalanche has caught up and they're pressing a brand into your soul because you asked for it. At least the Beezlebub is honest enough to call those what they are."

You stab a finger toward Ruri like you're trying to stab the truth into her the same way.

" _That_ is what they want. To chain you and make you theirs. You're not even allowed to run once you figure it out, because they'll hunt you down like the dog you've become. Besides, maybe you'll earn your freedom someday if you wait. You're a Devil, after all; you have forever. Until then, just bark on command. It makes things easier. Of course it does.

"They say the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Don't _ever_ , for _one single moment_ , think that they are _joking_."

You realise you're halfway out of your chair and the tip of your nail is half an inch from Ruri's nose. Her expression is faintly nervous.

You sigh, and drop back into your seat, letting your arm fall back to your side. It's been a long time since you've had a chance to rant like that, but it doesn't feel as satisfying as it used to. Maybe it's harder to talk shit after you've been hit, or however the expression goes. Maybe you just don't see the point.

"Sorry. Don't worry, the majority aren't really like that. Only the important ones get Evil Pieces, and they probably wouldn't take you anyway. You're more beautiful than most, but Devils are all about power and reputation and respect. Half their society is obsessed with proving themselves in those fancy Rating Games, as if a mummer's farce without casualties or consequences is meant to impress anyone who's known war. They want servants—slaves by any other name—strong enough to make their fellows tremble, and you… you and I, we don't qualify."

"They reincarnate people into Devils, don't they? Why do you keep calling them slaves?"

"What else would you call it when you exist solely at the whim of another? If you're in a Peerage, you have two choices: obey, or die a Stray."

You shrug.

"I bet most Peerages—master and members alike—don't think of it like that, or at least don't want to. And there'd probably be more Strays on the whole 'death before dishonour!' kick if they got treated like the Saracens after the _Dum Diversas_. But all the pretty words and feelings in the world can't change what it is.

"Don't worry about that, though. Actually, wait, do: worry about remembering not to bring it up if you're ever conversing with a Devil. Either it'll piss them off, which you probably don't want, or they'll agree – and that's even worse, because you _certainly_ don't want to get between a Stray and a pack of avenging Devils.

"Anyway, what I'm slowly wandering towards saying is that dealing with Devils is pretty simple. Remember they're always after something, don't give them anything you're not absolutely certain you won't want back, and back the fuck up if their name sounds familiar. If you've spent time with any branch of the Church, you've probably been introduced to the Ars Goetia, which is basically the who's who of Hell. Even your lovely lady Yasaka would tremble in the face of some of those monsters."

In hindsight, you probably should have taken your own advice. Fucking around right in the middle of Gremory and Sitri's city is—given the consequences—the most stupid thing you've ever done. You'll pay that red-haired chit back one day – but not by charging into her territory and demanding a fight. You can't take her whole Peerage. Hell, you wouldn't want to take _her_ , because even if you could, you'd rather not start a second Great War when the Lucifer decides to murder you and your entire species in retaliation.

No; while you haven't figured out what you _are_ going to do yet, you certainly know what you aren't.

"Honestly, someone like you can play it pretty casual if you run into a Devil. You're not one of their hereditary enemies, and they have good enough relations with Yasaka that she authorises them fucking _day passes_ to come here. As long as you remember to be careful, you'll be fine.

"Any questions?"

The next few hours are a back-and-forth on the finer points of Devil society as you understand them, mostly touching on what you know of each noble family and other famous Devils. Briefly, Ruri tries to ask you about the Great War, but the only people you want to talk about that with are dead. The conversation stalls soon after.

As alluring as Ruri looks, it'd be a bit hypocritical to tempt her into having sex with you straight after telling her that she didn't need to offer it in the first place. Best to leave that for now. Let her decide that she wants you to fuck her—she's far too inexperienced to phrase it the other way around—because she _wants you to fuck her_ , not because she wants your attention.

Maybe it's your pride talking, but you'd rather be the end than the means.

She bids you farewell shortly after sunset, and you spend a few more minutes at the table deactivating the privacy ward and hiding the fact it was ever there. Time to get back to your apartment – you've got work to do.


	27. Learning 4-3

You shut the apartment door behind you and settle yourself across the bed, flexing your wings out as you reach underneath it to where you shoved your suitcase last. Pulling it closer, you extract pen and paper, as well as all your old notes from the last time you redesigned the Sacred Gear extraction ritual. You went for comprehension then, but now you're goingfor breadth. You've seen the why; it's time to study the what.

A couple of hours into the ineluctable cycle of scribbling and scrapping ideas—the teetering pile of rejects next to you on the covers comes up to your shoulder—your door starts to chime. Lost in scholarship as you are, the sudden sound sends you springing off the bed, a light-spear crackling to life in your hand. You definitely do not yelp in surprise. Looking over, you see a pulsing light in the centre of the wood; on closer inspection, it's a communication circle, the same one every Fallen knows to use to contact Azazel, or at least somebody in the hierarchy, if necessary.

Ah. You know exactly who it is and why he's calling.

You walk over and poke the centre with a finger and Light both before stepping back. Sharp, bright flecks of power—like so many shattered emeralds—fall from a few inches above your head down to the floor, and in their wake stands a coruscant image of Azazel. He flickers once, twice, as if he's stepping somewhere without bothering to move through the intervening space, and then stabilises.

At least this time you're dressed for meeting people.

"My lord," you say. Your smile is small and demure, because anything wider would be desperate and unseemly. One of your wings shifts a little higher, like you're just stretching idly, and covers the rest of a particular poster you still haven't taken down. "How can I help you?"

"Ah, Raynare," he says, "good to see you're well. As you've probably guessed, the team I put together to work with Nabi is ready. It's led by Abathar, if you're curious. Where should I send them to meet her?"

Thank God Azazel didn't ask you to go along as an escort. Even if you weren't on—speaking generously—a holiday, Abathar can go fuck himself. Cocky son of a bitch – and the insult's even fitting, because his mother _is_ a bitch. It's not your fault God called her Johoel and you Jehiel, and you cast that name away when you Fell regardless. You're not a cut-price _anyone_.

"Outside the Ryokan Shimizu," you say, "644 Kagiya-chō, Shichijō-dōri, Wakamiya-agaru, Shimogyō-ku."

Nabi visited your apartment once, the day after the two of you captured the priest. She stayed exactly long enough to rattle off the address of the meeting-place, and left. It's almost as if she doesn't really like you anymore. What a shame.

"Excellent, thank you."

"No, thank _you_ , my lord," you reply. Do that make you sound too servile? Too much of a wallflower? God, why is this always so hard? "You didn't have to fix my wards, but they're much better now."

Azazel waves a lazy hand, and you try not to fixate on the way his muscles ripple beneath his sleeve. "Don't worry about it. I didn't do much. Now: have you made any progress on studying what happened to you?"

You suppress a smile. If you were softer, you might have even called the impulse fond. Of course he would want to know about that.

"Not yet – I'm currently working on redesigning the Sacred Gear extraction ritual again to get another look. Assuming the same three-day booking time, I should have my next set of results by Thursday."

You don't _expect_ Azazel to call you up again then, not by any means, but you're not going to protest if he does. If the only way you can keep his attention—keep him remembering you exist—is as an object of scientific curiosity, then that's what you'll do. God. You probably sound like the protagonist of some tawdry paperback romance. One day you'll be better than this.

One day.

"You can use one of our churches, you know," Azazel says. "Your banishment is only self-enforced, and I haven't told anyone outside the Cadre what happened in Kuoh, if you're worried about meeting the others. They may not even recognise you through the illusion."

You are so surprised it shows on your face.

Azazel's smile is the warmth of an embrace. "I know you better than you think, Raynare. If there was one thing Father was right about, it was the importance of caring. I wouldn't deserve my position if I wasn't familiar with the troubles of those I lead."

Deserve his position? You don't deserve _him_. You look away, toward a corner of the room. If he knows that, does he… does he know you love him? Oh God, please no. Surely there must be an Exorcist close enough to order a drive-by murder. Compared to the embarrassment threatening to set your face aflame, well, you've already died once. It wasn't so bad.

"Just think on it," he continues. "It's not like I need to tell anyone you're coming, even if you decide to say yes."

Will you?

"You're too kind, my lord," you reply, wrenching your emotions back under control. If Azazel doesn't know how you feel, you sure as fucking Hell aren't going to give it away by acting like you're three hundred instead of three thousand. "Is there anything else?"

"No," he says, "that's all. Good luck with the ritual, whatever you choose!"

The illusion collapses into crackling viridian sparks, and the circle on the door fades away.

You sigh, breathing out the last of that strange, churning-in-your-stomach mix of tension and affection, and step back toward your bed. The past few hours have been an exercise in how many brick walls you can break your pencil on, but each mistake is useful – you're making them here rather than on the ritual floor, after all, and you think you're starting to see the shape of where you need to go by the outline of everywhere you couldn't.

While you remember, though, you should do something else first. You've learned from your… well, not _mistake_ , given how interesting the actual concept was, but your misselection last time. You don't need a new way of combining circles; this isn't something to try and take the easy way out on. What you want is a better way of _looking_. Soulgazing is a well-studied topic, amongst the Grigori—and Heaven—at least, and given you're basically trying to construct an amplification ritual for the same, Mittelt is bound to have a few helpful books.

Like, say, _A Sliver Of Infinity_.


	28. Learning 4-4

One last flare of Light, as sharp as sunlight, and you finish carving the final circle into the floor of yet another warehouse. This one is far closer to your apartment, with only a single leyline in proximity, but it's not the church Azazel offered you, and that's the important part. You can't rely on him forever. When you died, you couldn't rely on him at all – and that was no-one's fault but your own.

Which means it's your responsibility to fix it, too.

You straighten, and take a careful, wing-assisted leap to the centre of the ritual, kneeling down in the empty space set aside as the focus. Closing your eyes, you stop breathing, holding it in even as your lungs tremble and your chest catches fire from the inside. You can feel the strain pounding at the edges of your control, electrochemical impulses flooding your nerves with desperate purpose.

You do not succumb. Your body is not you – it is yours. You were not born, you were made, and you made it in turn. The soul you have prepared this ritual to see is the whole, encompassing truth of the woman who calls herself Raynare; anything more is about as important as a pair of clothes, and you take pride in it the same way. A pride that will not bow before the demands of your form like you're some crude _human_.

You fix an image of your soul in your mind, bright and beautiful and burning. You can see it reflected on the insides of your eyes. In fact, it's all you _can_ see as darkness creeps in from the corners of your vision. You are still staring at it when you finally pass out, exhaling as you collapse against the stone in a heap that would be undignified if you were anyone else.

When you blink your lashes open a few seconds later, you stand on the sky. It is the colour of glass, only visible by the Light that reflects through it. There is no phenomenon on Earth the same shade as your soul – just like for every other Angel—whether former or not—it is a radiance unique to you. Sakura blossoms, the horizon at dawn, lips, gemstones; you've heard all these comparisons and more, but you are a child of God, however wayward. You were _made_ to be beyond compare.

Beneath you, your soul burns. Vibrant, coruscating flame hangs in space without life or air. It is strangled in lust, lies, betrayal, and murder, but you can still see the roiling currents of Light beneath; unlike last time, you do not stare straight but sideways, watching the shadows they cast on your sin to learn their shapes. You do not know how long you spend there – it is not as if time matters in a place like this.

Oh, it still _exists_ , but such transitory concerns are easily forgotten in the face of yourself.

In the end, a pattern emerges. It is, of course, impossible, but you seem to stumble on six such things before breakfast, so you dismiss your incredulity before the facts. You remember the last time you made a similar journey, one to the heart of your soul and the shard of God that lay within. You remember how it bled Light – not the simmering starshine of your own blood, but _Light_ , pure and primal.

When you look at your soul, you see it grow. Slowly—so slowly that it would be shamed by a glacier—but surely. That's not the important thing, though. You knew that already. What you didn't, however, is that the Light of your soul is growing at the _exact same rate_ that shard of God was leaking. You had assumed it was the cause – but you didn't realise until now that it was quite as literal a translation into effect as that.

You surface to a room your slowly-clearing eyes tell you is not on fire, and to stone that your cheek and shoulder tell you is far too cold to be melted slag. You shove yourself off the floor a little too fast to be graceful, and flex your Light to release your wings. They burst from your skin as easily as ever. That's good. You haven't crippled yourself like last time. Score one for caution. A quick consultation of a watch, since you were a little silly last time not to bring one, tells you that you were under for sixteen hours.

So. You have another thirty-two left before your lease expires on the ritual space. There's no reason to leave early; even if you gave a fuck about whether or not you were inconveniencing someone, nobody else would have been booked in until your time expired, and you won't be interrupted for similar reasons as the ones behind that particular policy.

(Well, you would be if you decided to do something stupid enough like set up a cascading ritual bomb like that idiot the last time you were here, but you prefer your head attached to your neck instead of your elbow, and your hair and intestines to remain in their respective places.

Yasaka, it turns out, is not above setting examples).

Point is, the ritual space is the perfect place to sit and ponder what you've learned.

Okay. You knew, before, that there is a shard of God in your soul. Strictly speaking, as a once-true Angel, your soul _is_ a shard of God—a sliver of infinity—but your Light is already liquid. Already living. What you found in your core is… not _dead_ , exactly. It can't be dead if it still has Light. A better word would be inert. God himself is gone, but his memory still has strength. Sacred Gears wouldn't work, otherwise. But comparing it to your soul is like comparing ice and water. The same truth expressed in different ways. And just like ice, it is melting.

No. That doesn't feel right. You don't remember it shrinking. You looked at it and could not see, for how can one see forever? You listened to it and did not hear, for how can one hear eternity? God was not bound by physical law. _Ex nihilo, omnia._ The shard isn't melting, it's just… there. A constant constantly apart from the otherwise-logical operation of your universe.

(Well, mostly logical.

Sometimes mostly logical.

If you're bribing the right people).

Enough rambling. You've been studying a lot of science recently, so the comparison makes itself: you have a possibly infinite fusion—or fission, or _whatever_ —reactor plugged into your soul. It originates from God Himself. It isn't dead, just not alive – and when it comes to things like this, there's a difference. It's feeding power into you, and has been, presumably, every single moment since you were reborn.

Hmm. You aren't certain, but the more you think about it, the more you at least _have_ a hypothesis why you're alive. Or part of one, anyway. You're a Fallen Angel. When you died, your soul had nowhere to go. Cast out from Heaven, denied by Hell. You were made to be eternal, but without anything to anchor you to this world any longer, you could do naught but disperse beneath the weight of Gremory's annihilating will.

But, as it happens, there _is_ an anchor inside your soul now. Something that could have called to you—as Light calls to Light—and nourished you from nothingness. Something that could have caught you as you fell into the space between shadows. The irony is even beautiful – a Fallen Angel saved from death by a memory of God, or whatever the shard actually is.

You're no closer to an explanation for _that_ , or why it exists in the first place, or even why it bound itself to you over, well, literally any Angel—or Fallen Angel—ever, but you know more today than you did yesterday. For now, that is enough. You're nowhere near finished studying your soul yet.


	29. Learning 4-5

"Sabetha, why did you bring me to a bar?"

"I'm not an encyclopedia," you say, amused. "Sitting around in a library doing nothing but spitting out hour-long answers to your questions is not something I want to spend every third day or so doing, and that's not even the best way to learn how the supernatural world works. It's _helpful_ , certainly, but there are some things you can only discover through experience. I have enough for ten of you, but I don't think you want me to figure out how to dump a bunch of my memories in your head – and _I_ certainly don't want to either."

You gesture to the bar—it's called _Magic Hour_ , so hopefully the proprietor has better prices than they do a sense of humour—whose door you stand outside.

"Thus, a bar. You should be able to guess what waits within. You can sit with me. You can sit somewhere else. I'll keep an eye on you either way, make sure you don't get into something you shouldn't, but apart from that you're on your own. Try to make a friend – even if they're only for a night."

"I don't want to," she says; her voice would be uncharacteristically solemn if you weren't aware of exactly which issues are prompting it. "Can we do something else?"

"No. Why are you so reluctant? This isn't the girl who walked up to a Fallen Angel in the middle of Kyoto and tried to proposition her."

"You—didn't know me." Ruri meets your eyes, but you can tell she doesn't want to. "You couldn't. They will."

"I doubt every single person in this city knows you're a half-breed, Ruri." Your reply is as blunt as a hammer, and for much the same reasons. "Yes, of course I could tell. Kitsune don't come from Russia. They don't _go_ to Russia. They hate it over there. So do I. Too strongly tied to the Church and too fucking cold by half. The only reason I could imagine one staying there long enough to raise you—assuming your mysterious sister wasn't born there too—is if he or she, probably she if your hybrids work similarly to ours, fell in love or at least had a kid with something Russian.

"I didn't want to push you for the truth, but this is getting silly. I've said it before – you're not an Angel, a Devil, or human, so I don't care in the slightest what you are. The whole 'filthy gaijin' stereotype the youkai love to embrace is stupid. As far as I'm concerned, they're the fucking foreigners. For God's sake, there's a Jōmon figurine in this city of—of someone I used to know."

You remember Kalawarner with a sword stabbed through her arm, more blood on her than armour, and the desperate search for a human tribe with some sort of shaman to stabilise her enough that you could get her back to Heaven. Even as an Angel, you were shit at healing. You had to awe them into compliance, and the young girl—because they were all young then, even when they died—took _far too fucking long_ to close the last, bone-deep cut in Kalawarner's thigh with your help. So long, in fact, that one of their artists managed to scratch a likeness of her into a flat stone.

She'd been so out of it—thanks to the sword the Devil had dipped into his own blood beforehand that you wouldn't risk some tiny pagan healer removing—that she'd thought the whole experience was _fun_. She visited them a couple more times, and one day came back with a pottery statue: weird eyes, a dumpy body, and two magnificent wings. Kalawarner kept it in her room until she Fell, or so she told you, and you were with her when she dumped it in the Japanese Emperor's treasure room the day after.

It amazed the both of you when, on an idle whim, you visited the Imperial Household Museum of Kyoto a millennia later and found it as part of one of the exhibits.

Ruri blinks. "Jōmon figurine?"

"The Japan you know was founded a little under two and a half thousand years ago. The time before that is generally called the Jōmon period. I don't know when I came here for the first time, exactly, but I remember the display dated the figurine at about three thousand. I think you get the point."

"Have you ever tried telling a real kitsune that?"

You laugh, low and rich. "Why do you think I had to leave Kyoto the last time I was here? Seriously though, you need to relax. I did my research; not many kitsune, if any, bother coming to this place, and I'm pretty sure they don't care enough about you to circulate your description to every minion or courtier or lover or secretary or whatever it is they have. In fact, I'd hazard a guess that not all of the kitsune even _know_ you by description in the first place."

Naturally, the grand total of your research was asking the youkai—you _think_ she was a kappa—you booked the ritual with if she had any idea of a decent place to drink at. Exactly the sort of question your ordinary Fallen would ask, and you doubt that a receptionist would frequent the same establishments as her bosses, or even know where they were. She might have given you a decent answer, she may have sent you to a tourist trap, or perhaps she directed you to a purely mortal bar. As long as it's not the last, it'll be fine.

"If you say so."

"I do." You clap a hand on Ruri's shoulder, letting your thumb drift down the side of her neck. "Now get going. I might have all day, but I don't feel like wasting it."

She doesn't lean into your touch, but she doesn't shift away from it either. "This had better not just be an excuse to get drunk. Or to get me drunk. Or both."

"Ruri, Ruri, Ruri," you say, shaking your head in dismay. "Do I _really_ strike you as that sort of person?"

You lean down, resting your chin on her other shoulder.

"I don't think you could handle me when I'm drunk, anyway." Your breath tickles her ear. "Unless you want me to start handling _you_ without a care for who might be watching."

She shivers – whether from your actions, your implication, or even nerves about the night ahead, you don't know. "I—I believe you."

You note she does not say about _what_.

"Good girl," you say, just to draw out the pout—impotent aggravation has never been so satisfying—and push her gently toward the door. "Now get going. I've changed my mind: it's better for the two of us to be seen separately. You need to spread your wings alone."

"Aren't I supposed to spread my tails?" You can hear the amused curl of her lips.

Oh, Ruri.

"I'd prefer your legs," you say, "but if that's where you want it, I can oblige."

You're not sure whether the noise she makes is supposed to be your name, a gasp, or her impression of a dying balloon, but it's soon drowned out by the rippling paroxysm of your laughter. Seriously, your little student can't be this cute. It makes you want to kill something. You're still laughing when she marches into the bar, the very picture of affronted dignity. Such a silly girl.

You straighten a couple of minutes later—long enough for Ruri to have established herself as a customer—and enter _Magic Hour_ yourself. She's seated in a corner, on one of the lounges, so you decide to embrace the cliche and hop up on a barstool. The bartender's head scrapes the roof, and his face looks like it fought in a war – as the battlefield. A Namahage running a bar; one that's open almost all night. Oh, the irony.

You suspect you're going to be here a while, between Ruri's probable timidity and the fact nobody else has arrived yet, so you order a glass of whatever's in the bottle at one end of the line behind the bar. Your tastes aren't exactly very refined when it comes to alcohol—the point isn't the _flavour_ —so your plan is simple: start there, and go through the row one-by-one until your time is up. For safety's sake (both Ruri's and your own), you don't plan to drink any faster than what it takes to feel it, but a girl can dream.

You're barely a fifth of the way through when one of the more recent customers gets up from his table and plops down in the couch next to Ruri. Her surprise—and apprehension—is visible, but either the boy is smoother than he looks or there's a genuine connection, because soon enough they're smiling and laughing at each other. How adorable.

You knock back another glass, and keep pretending the bar's counter is more interesting than even the mysteries of your soul.

Ruri and her mystery youkai flirt circles around one another for another hour or so. Occasionally she glances over at you, but you give her disinterest if you give her anything at all; she's on her own here. The message seems to be sinking in – every time she turns back, she gets bolder and turns up the charm as well. She's a quick learner, if nothing else.

Halfway down the row of drinks, on some fairly plain sake, you notice the atmosphere finally starting to change. The boy's hands linger on her own when she pulls out her phone to show him something and he tugs it over so he can see; her laughter is an exaggerated thing—like the rest of her movements—that emphasises the way she… bounces. This is a scene you've seen a thousand times before, and that's without counting how often you're the one in her shoes; you know exactly how it's going to end.


	30. Learning 4-6

Ruri walks past you, hand-in-hand with her new-found lover, and you don't watch her go. She looked at you one last time before she leaned in to whisper in his ear, and you smiled encouragingly. The expression always feels strange on your face. She smiled back, but it seemed a little disappointed – maybe she was realising how much time she'd wasted before by not daring to be brave. God. That thought _hurt_. No wonder heroes are usually idiots, if that's the sort of shit that goes through their brains.

As she passes, you focus a fraction of your Light on the spell you cast on a stone you slipped into her pocket when you met her today, well before either of you arrived at _Magic Hour_. It pulses, as short and soft as blinking, and you cut the link before it can be noticed. Good. You said you'd keep an eye on Ruri when you were convincing her to go in, and you didn't mean just while you were at the bar. Nabi would eviscerate you if you let Ruri come to harm—physical harm, at least—while you were supposed to be teaching her.

(Alright, fine. You'd prefer if somebody didn't ruin her pretty face either. Lovers aren't hard to find for someone like you, but they're rarely _quite_ as beautiful as Ruri is, or as much fun to play with).

You give her and her boytoy a couple of minutes to get out of the place, and a few more to have done it after necking on the stairs. Another flicker of Light tells you the approximate direction of the stone, and you pay for the last of your drinks—a bottle of some American beer, though Dohnaseek would probably have claimed it didn't deserve the name, the snob—before pushing off the stool and leaving.

In the hallway, you weave a second lie around you to cover Sabetha, this time of a tanned, vaguely-European woman with hair halfway between roses and flame. You'll stand out, but that doesn't matter. Ruri will be too distracted—and nowhere near paranoid enough—to see you unless you're sloppy, and her new friend doesn't even know you exist. Anyone else who sees you ought to stand in awe.

The night air is like frost on your skin, and you let a little Light leak deeper into your bones to ward it off. Around you, the bustle and brightness of the late-evening city quickens your step. Thankfully, nobody dares to brush up against you, perhaps intimidated by your height, your pace, or your appearance. Crowds are so irritating. So confining. You prefer Kyoto in the early morning, just before sunset, when you're the only one around.

You catch up to Ruri after about fifteen minutes. She hasn't found or thrown away the stone yet, thankfully – you suspect, however, that given what she's currently doing, you could be flaring the spell as hard as you like and she wouldn't even notice. A more polite person would look away, but it's nothing you've not seen or done before. The rooftop you're crouching on is relatively dirty; though, as you raise an eyebrow, perhaps not quite as dirty as Ruri's willing to be.

You didn't think she had it in her.

Well.

Perhaps that's not exactly the right phrasing.

It feels a little demeaning to be reduced to a voyeur, but you chose to let Ruri enjoy herself rather than keep her for your own, and it's a—much—better sight than being murdered by her sister. The two of them are quite loud, but nobody comes to investigate; probably a result of the hastily-erected muffling spell you can feel tickling at the edges of your mind. Fortunately for you, it's nowhere near strong enough to fool anyone but a mortal, and even then not a particularly strong-willed one.

You idle away the time running commentary on their techniques until Ruri presses the boy breathlessly away in the aftermath and starts fixing her clothes. He does the same, and a couple of minutes later the two of them stroll out of the alley like nothing happened. That's your cue to follow, so you drop down into the same alley and leave it a little while later, making sure to avoid a particular patch near the wall. Another pulse of Light locates the stone again, and you reorient yourself before continuing on.

Huh. So that's where they're going.

You recognise the buildings you're starting to pass; by the time you set eyes on Ruri again, she's walking into a very familiar hotel. Maybe Nabi told her this is where to take her conquests, or maybe it's somewhere she found she liked after her forays into the human world. Doesn't really matter either way. You leave them long enough to book and get into the elevator before slipping into the hotel, looking for all the world like a guest returning home after a (relatively early) night partying, and follow the prompts of your spell.

There's a pause for a while in a direction that seems suspiciously like it'd line up with the elevator between floors, which gives you time to figure out what you're going to do. You consider turning up and offering to join in, but you're not sure how Ruri would react. Her lover isn't important; having you and Ruri both is the sort of night other people dream of. He'd accept the moment you opened your mouth. Ruri, however… half-kitsune, half-succubus or not, she might not appreciate you turning up to infringe on her claim.

More importantly, it makes you seem a little desperate; like you can't find ways to entertain yourself at night when she's not around. Certainly there was enough banter between you and Mittelt in the days after each time she turned up in your bedroom while you were entertaining a guest to reinforce that assumption. That brat's temper could flare as easily as her chest refused to.

No; you think you'll leave Ruri to her own devices.

Hmm. Now _there's_ an idea.

Anyway, you still need a strategy.

Oh, of course. If it's good enough for Azazel—in a manner of speaking—it's good enough for you. Triggering the spell again, you see the stone still hasn't moved, so you duck into a nearby bathroom, pull a scrap of paper from the notepad in one of your pockets, and start scribbling down a seal. You don't know _much_ about the art, but basic seals to transmit sound from one to the other are invaluable for spying, and you've done plenty of that in your time.

Just crank up the intensity, slap it on the door, and you can listen in to your heart's content. Not that you're exactly content about it, but you don't have much of a choice. Everything had better go fucking perfectly so you never have to worry about doing something like this again, or you're going to be pissed.

You finish the seal—and its partner—before pushing your Light through both to link them together. Afterward, you activate the spell again, and note the stone has moved. The impression it gives you leads you to a room on the fifth floor, which you walk straight past so you can get to the blind-spot of the hallway camera and overload it with a quick spark of lightning. Quick and dirty, but that's all you need right now.

You trigger the locator one more time, just to confirm, and then press the paper bearing the seal to the underside of the door. You have to fold it a couple of times to make sure it doesn't stick out, but as long as the seal is still one continuous unit, it doesn't really matter what shape the plane it's on takes. When you remove your hand, the paper stays attached to the wood, courtesy of the same spell you suspect Ruri used to hold up her dress the first time you met. If there's one thing you've found about basic household sorcery, it's that it's _really fucking useful_ at times you wouldn't expect.

You move over to another room, three doors down, and listen carefully; you can't hear anyone inside, and a quick inspection after the lock clicks open under your touch reveals it is indeed unoccupied. A few strokes with a Light-sharpened fingernail across your sun line draw enough blood to catalyse a simple privacy ward on the door. You don't need to cover the full room – you don't care if people _think_ about it, just that a maid or something doesn't try to come in.

Settling yourself on the bed, you place the receiver seal on the bedside table, and activate it. Sure enough, sound starts coming through, and you have to fiddle with the volume quickly. Ah, the enthusiasm of youth. You stretch out, close your eyes, and wait.

Eventually, you hear a conversation.

It's rather interesting; you discover he's an inugami, that he has a few lonely friends, and that Ruri is surprisingly open to new things. Not something you saw coming, but more power to her. Maybe you'll need to debauch her less than you thought.

You hear those friends arrive—three in total—and Ruri finally seems to realise what she's agreed to, because there's a lot of questions about why she's started to dress. She apologises, flustered, and claims the night was great but she's not ready to go so wild so soon. Good. It was getting boring sitting around here.

Then one of the new inugami arrivals complains angrily about having wasted all of his time without even getting something out of it, and there's a chorus of agreements with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Ruri stutters an apology, but the same inugami claims that isn't enough. He says he needs _some_ form of compensation, just like his friends. A pair of footsteps approach the door, settling there, and they're far too heavy to be Ruri's.

You sigh.

Fucking _really?_

You've seen humans with more class than this.


	31. Learning 4-7

There is nothing in this world you hold sacred.

Once, there was, when you were young and a fool, but no longer. You know exactly what and where _devotion_ will get you, and you left it long ago. Morality is a trap. It has no place amongst the truly free. Let Angels have their lickspittle righteousness and priests their obsequious preaching. You have broken that cage, and taken up your new shape.

And yet.

You like to think you are not a _monster_. You are no Trihexa, all apocalypse eyes and annihilation. Your name is not spoken in the same breath as Grendel or the Morningstar. There's more refinement to your soul than that – sometimes it's just hard to find.

And then others you run into a group of shitty little youkai planning to rape someone you're—fine—a little fond of. Sex is an expression of lust and occasionally love. It is a gift to be _shared_ , never _taken_. Everyone you've ever fucked knew what they were in for, and they wanted it. Anything less would be insulting – to you, to your pride, to your Fall.

You shove yourself off the bed, cutting off the seal; you don't need it any longer. The door to your room slams open under your shove, leaving the doorknob-and-lock behind, and you stalk toward Ruri's own. A light-spear burns in your hand, pulsing in time to the furious beat of your heart, and your wings unfurl like an army's banners.

It's been a very long time since you played the avenging Angel, and by _God_ you didn't think you'd look forward to it ever again like you do now.

You heard no footsteps closer to Ruri's door before you cut the seal, so the inugami is surely still standing between her and it. That means he's also between you and Ruri. How unfortunate. Whatever shall you do?

Your arm cracks like a whip, hurling the light-spear through the door at roughly leg-height. The howl that follows tells you everything you need to know. In the same motion, you step forward, grabbing the door by the handle and the charred hole in it, and tear it off at the hinges. The metal creaks and groans, but you are a Fallen Angel, and more importantly you are _angry_. One last wrenching twist, and you're holding a slab of wood taller than you are and twice as wide.

The scene revealed makes you smile, wild and wicked. Four shocked youkai—three inugami and Ruri—and a fifth collapsed on the ground with a spear in the back of his thigh. One of them recovers faster than the rest, leaping at you with his mouth and nose morphing into a snarling snout – you skip two steps back with a wing-assisted hop and smash him out of the air with the door. Fucking idiot. It splinters under the impact, but so do the bones in his right arm, and the sound he makes when he lands on it is physically satisfying. Who do these dogs _think they are?_

You drop what remains of the door on his head, driving a light-spear into his calf as you step over his body. He convulses, then goes limp. Is that all he can take before blacking out? Pathetic. How are you supposed to enjoy this?

"S—Sabetha?"

"Just a moment, Ruri," you say, holding up a hand. "I have trash to collect."

Another light-spear snaps into your hand, and a flick of your wrist has it searing circles through the air until it's a solid wall of crackling Light.

"Listen, mutts," you say. Your voice is the steady calm of a well-aimed knife. "I have had a _very long_ month. I don't know who forgot to teach you that no means no, but I believe in an eye for an eye, so here's a sneak preview of the next five minutes: I'm going to stab you until you beg me to stop, and then I'm _not going to listen_."

By now, the light-spear in the first inugami's thigh has faded, and he's slowly pushing himself to his feet. The wound is deep but cauterised, and though the leg trembles beneath him, he manages to stand. That makes three; two fresh, one wounded. Ruri looks a little too shellshocked to be counted on in a fight right now, but she might be over-exaggerating for effect. Doesn't matter either way.

"Who the fuck are you?" The voice is low, growly, and about as terrifying as a puppy.

Light floods your bones until your marrow sings with it—a rampaging crescendo to match the violence brewing in the corners of your smile—as you take one step and then another, straight toward the inugami. There's an art to destroying your enemies; it's like theatre, if theatre was a bloodsport.

Unfortunately, you're shit at fighting and you hate theatre, so rather than dancing around the inugami's slashing claws as if you were halfway between a shadow and air, you just kick him in the balls before he reaches you. He doesn't quite fold around your foot, but there's a whine like a pricked balloon singing duet with a mosquito – and then your whole body _detonates_ as you flare the stoked bonfire of your soul.

When your Light fades, the walls of the hallway are bleached bone-white, and the inugami is slumped six feet away, flame licking at what's left of his clothes. The rest are probably what the pile of ash beneath your feet used to be. You glance down at where you kicked him, and chuckle. You were considering a line about 'come and have a go if you think you're hard enough' when you first arrived, but if that's anything to go by, you wouldn't have noticed the difference.

You let your laughter go on just a little too long, and snap your jaw shut like you're trying to bite off the sound. The brief silence that follows is broken only by the sawing buzz of your light-spear.

"So," you say, drumming a foot against the floor, "hurry up. I don't have all night. Who's next?"

A dull sound—like someone dragging a heavy box—behind you answers that question; you toss your light-spear at one of the two inugami in the hotel room to distract them and spin to face it. You can take them one at a time, so best to ward off any bad ideas of actually _using_ their advantage in numbers. The inugami you thought down and out must have been faking it or something, because he's trying to ambush you – but with a broken arm and a limp that scrapes one foot against the floor with every step, he's barely crossed a metre before you replace part of his shoulder with barb-tipped Light.

You dart forward and help him on his way to the floor with a brutal knee to the head when he falls, your wings snapping down to drive you further into the air. He lands so heavily you fancy you can hear his brain bouncing off the inside of his skull. You cover your back with another sweeping spear as you turn back to the room, only to find that Ruri has just lit her leg on fire and decided to emulate her teacher.

What a diligent pupil.

She's still kicking the same inugami as you stalk toward the only one left standing. He settles one fist in front of the other, and his words come out muffled by the doglike snout that has replaced part of his face. You think this is the same one Ruri took here from the bar, though given his state of dress there are few identifying marks. Besides, well, the fact he's the only one naked in the first place.

"I didn't expect they'd do something like this," he says; if you ignore the slobber, the voice is roughly the same as the one you remember being the least enthusiastic about this whole thing, "but I cannot abandon my f—"

"Oh, shut up," you say, slinging a light-spear that burns a chunk off his hip when he's too slow to dodge fully in such close quarters. "If you had half the honour you're trying to bullshit, you'd have told your friends to let her go. Now heel, boy."

"I have heard that insult many times before." He ducks low, perhaps anticipating a second light-spear, and launches himself at your legs. "It won't provoke me!"

Does he really think that just because the hallway is too small to let you stretch out your wings, committing to the _air_ is a good idea? Hyoudou had the bullshit speed granted by the Boosted Gear on his side, but this idiot of an inugami is no Red Dragon Emperor. You launch yourself off the floor, innate flexibility letting you pull your knees to your shoulders, and he sails underneath you, out of the room, to crash onto the body of his fallen friend.

He—hah—whoofs out a breath at the impact, trying to tuck himself into an ungainly roll – how kind of him to offer you a target. You twist in the air, plucking a light-spear from your soul, and plant it in his ass. The inugami screams; it sounds manly at first, until a flick of your arm adds one in the other cheek and his howl doubles in pitch. You walk over and wrench each one out, inhaling the scent of sizzling flesh, before stabbing them in his heels.

"That wasn't an insult, mutt," you say. "That was a _statement of intent_."

Kicking him once in the side of the head to reinforce the message, you return to Ruri's room. The inugami she set herself on is crumpled on the floor, most of his body scorched or still on fire as she pants for breath.

"Feels good, doesn't it?" you say, walking over to stand beside her. "To know you're the one in control."

She's silent for a time, looking at the ground.

"I don't understand." Her voice is low. "Why did this happen? Why are you here?"

"You're not special," you reply, and she whips her head to face you. "You didn't get singled out because there's something wrong with you. This happens to women from almost every race in almost every society. A bunch of idiots saw a pretty girl who seemed indecisive enough to change her mind once and figured maybe she would again with a little help. Fucking stupid, but that's life. The fact you're kitsune and they're inugami doesn't help, but it'd have happened regardless. Your mistake wasn't saying no – it was saying yes in the first place."

You brush a trail of ash from below her collarbone before it can stain her shirt.

"Whatever fun you've had with humans, you've always been able to make the rules. You're beautiful enough to make anyone you choose worry too much about accidentally driving you away to think of anything else, and if things still go wrong, you can overpower them easily. Thing is, there are plenty of beautiful creatures in Kyoto, and a two-tails like you isn't the biggest kid on the block anymore. This sort of thing doesn't happen _as_ often in our world, where everything's much smaller and grudges can last for centuries, but you need to learn how to be careful."

"You weren't when it came to me."

"I made my mistakes," you reply, almost gently, "a long, long time ago. I wasn't careful with you because I could tell I didn't need to be. We are _student_ and teacher for a reason, Ruri."

"Yeah," she says slowly, "we are."

A pause.

"Why were you here, Sabetha? How did you know?"

"I told you before," you reply, "that I was going to keep an eye on you, and make sure you didn't get into something you shouldn't. I don't often keep my promises, but I meant that one."

"Were—were you following me the whole night?"

You laugh. "Don't be silly. I just left a stone with a couple of spells on it in your pocket; a locator and something else to feed me sound whenever I activated it, so I could check up on you occasionally. I got lucky when I heard you agree to the orgy; those can be rough on the unprepared, and I didn't think you sounded too certain about it. Sure enough, I was right, and thankfully I got here in time."

You are, of course, lying.

"Oh, so _now_ you care."

Care is a... strong word.

"Excuse me?" You arch an elegant eyebrow in her direction. "Maybe it's part of my _responsibilities_ —God I hate that word—but you don't sound very grateful after everything I've done. I'd have expected at least a 'thank you'."

"Thank you?" Ruri snarls. "I didn't even want to _be_ here tonight. I kept trying to get your attention, and you kept ignoring me. No matter how much I flirted with Takashi, you didn't seem to care – Hell, you _smiled_ at me when I made it clear I was going to have sex with him! Am I really that much of a toy to you?"

You blink. You haven't been this surprised since you found out what Sacred Gear Hyoudou really carried. What the Hell is wrong with this girl?

"Sorry, _what?_ I told you what I'd brought you there to do. This is exactly the problem I was talking about – agreeing to things you're not totally sure about!" You take a step back, closer to the centre of the room, and flare your wings. "And I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm a Fallen Angel. You're lovely, and I'd gladly fuck you whenever you let me, but expecting monogamy out of me is like expecting Uriel to pull the stick out of his ass."

"You told me to make a friend—not find a lover—while flirting with me the whole time! I don't know how this—this _shit_ is supposed to work. How else am I supposed to take that?" She shakes her head. "You don't get it, do you? You're beautiful and ancient and a terrible tease and crueler than I thought and you _picked me_."

She drops onto the bed, hands grasping the sheets.

"Nobody ever picks me."

"I swear to God, if the next thing out of your mouth is 'I love you', I'm going to slap you across the face." You raise a palm in emphasis. "Don't waste those words on someone you've known for a couple of weeks. Don't _ever_ waste them."

Stupid, _stupid_ girl. You know exactly how much love is worth. You feel the price with every step.

Ruri giggles uncontrollably, with the occasional hiccup that sounds closer to a sob – but whenever you look over, her eyes are dry. "I knew you'd say something like that. Don't worry, I'm not in love with you. It's just—I'm a Sage, you know? Senjutsu's the one thing I never needed to be taught."

She shifts to face you, and there's a weight behind her gaze, like a storm on the edge of the horizon.

"I felt your soul, Sabetha. Old and cold and terribly, terribly lonely. A dead star surrounded by other people's pain. And then you decided to seduce me, and agreed to teach me, and it made me feel so _special_ , that someone like you—with a soul like that, so angry and jaded and sad—would choose _me_ over all the kitsune in Kyoto. I don't want you to love me. I just want you to be my friend."

Ruri laughs, a little bitter, and gestures around the room. At the stains on the sheets and the bodies on the floor.

"Though maybe not if it involves _this_."


	32. Learning 4-8

"The last group of friends I had got murdered by a bunch of Devils. One of them I first met the day God made me. I don't really feel like replacing them right now with a little foxgirl who thinks she _knows_ me, no matter how pretty she is. I'll teach you, but don't expect much more than that right now."

Ruri watches you with that same, heavy gaze. Each breath she takes is longer than the last.

"It happened recently, didn't it?" she asks quietly. "Is that what brought you to Kyoto?"

"Stay the fuck out of my soul, Ruri," you say, flat as a sword. "I came here for the leylines, like everybody else does."

You didn't run. Romania was the coward's option, not Kyoto. You're just not stupid enough to try and fight an enemy who already beat you once without getting better tricks. That's not running, that's pragmatism, and fuck her if she wants to imply otherwise.

(To be fair, she's probably not. But you're not feeling particularly fair).

Ruri blinks, and when she looks at you again, her eyes no longer remind you of God's. "Sorry."

"Go and help me drag the rest of these idiots inside. We still need to clean up."

Ruri nods, and follows you out. Someone's bound to come and check on the commotion, or at least the camera. You didn't hear anyone leave any of the rooms in the hall during the fight, but then again you're not sure you would have noticed in the first place. Thankfully, there's no-one around snapping pictures of dog-faced men with a phone; you guess it's too early in the morning for that sort of thing. That, or there aren't many people on this floor to begin with. The hotel didn't look particularly busy when you arrived, and the story was similar the first time you were here with Ruri too.

You lift the last inugami up first, and carry him back into the room; he groans, and you drive an elbow into his solar plexus a couple of times to remind his brain to sit down and shut up. Ruri pulls the other one across the floor by his feet, apparently not taking the opportunity to drive her finger into the hole in his calf in the process. Silly girl. Revenge is always the most satisfying when your enemy is already beaten.

You toss the inugami toward the bed, help Ruri do the same to hers, and then lift the others one at a time until you've stacked up the world's ugliest petting zoo on the sheets.

"Keep an eye on them," you say. "I need to fix the door. Doors."

Now that you think of it, you sort of broke your own as well. Oops. You leave the room without waiting for her acknowledgement, and march over to it; unlike Ruri's, your door is still attached to the hinges, and the doorknob is still attached to the lock. They're just… not attached to each other. You push the door shut until the doorknob-and-lock lines up with the hole, and start to chant. Most of the time you use this spell for repairing beds, but that's not all it was designed for.

It's like watching a clock go backward: the wood shudders and cracks as it regrows, splitting out splinters and sawdust. The former bounce off your skin, and the latter stains it. A minute or so later, the door looks—while perhaps not new—much less like a Fallen Angel crashed through it on her way to deliver a no-holds-barred beatdown to a bunch of morons.

Unfortunately, the door to _Ruri's_ room is in multiple pieces, some of which you think are still embedded in the inugami you broke it on. You're tempted to summon something to deal with it, but you didn't bring any reagents with you, so looks like you'll have to do things the old-fashioned way. How demeaning.

You spend five minutes or so gathering the various fragments—including ripping a couple of wicked splinters from the inugami's arm—and laying them out in the rough shape of a door on the floor outside. Light ripples between your fingers, and you crouch down to trace a shimmering, sakura line around the edges of where the door _should_ be. Thank God for a perfect memory. That task done, you stand, and start to chant again.

This time, the spell takes almost a quarter of an hour to finish. The wait is quietly satisfying: if the door takes this long to repair, then you must have hit that shitty little dog _really fucking hard_. Eventually, with one last, creaking groan, the door is whole again. Minus the part where it's still attached to the hinges, of course, but that's next.

You carry it back into the room, fitting it against the doorframe from the inside—best not to leave a barrier between you and Ruri, lest one of them wakes up too early—and cast the spell a third time. You're pretty sure Mending was invented separately by at least a dozen different race. It's moments like this that explain why. Sorcery is not just about dropping comets and breathing hurricanes – in many ways, it's an art of small conveniences.

You cut your Light from the spell, but not before flaring it around your hands to clean them off. A job well done. You can't do much about the bleached walls, nor the scorch marks or the mess, but hotels have to deal with stranger things all the time. As long as the cleaners don't come and end up seeing one of the inugami whose snouts have persisted through unconsciousness, they won't think of magic as the first explanation. Nothing you can do about that; a privacy ward would give your interference away.

"Right," you say, "Ruri, come here."

"Why?" she asks, because of course she does. Fucking brats and their fucking _feelings_.

"Look," you say, rolling your eyes, "I said you're not my friend. I didn't say I hated you. Hell, I said I'd still teach you, and right now I'm trying _not_ to get my student arrested by a couple of youkai with their dicks stuck in a rulebook and their balls firmly in the grasp of their kitsune overlords. So pay attention. This is what we in the business call _not being an idiot._ "

Bells would be jealous of Ruri's giggle. "Don't be mean. I was just asking."

"Get used to it." You glance at the bed—and the stack of inugami upon it—to make sure none of them are moving before you step over. "I didn't tell God to fuck off so I could be _nice_. Now take my hand and call up your chakra. I need to give these idiots alcohol poisoning."

"Wait," she asks, reaching out to clasp your fingers, "you can do that?"

"No. But they'll feel like they should have it by the time I'm done fucking with their heads."

It won't hold against a determined investigation, especially not if Kyoto's supernatural police break out a post-cognitive spell or two, but the point is to avoid one of those in the first place. A bunch of friends go out to party, fuck themselves up, get in a fight, and eventually limp back to a hotel to lick their wounds. Maybe literally, considering they're inugami. Point is, that sort of thing happens all the time, and what self-respecting 'alpha males' go to the authorities to complain about getting their asses kicked? Even dogs have pride.

These are inugami, not Devils. You Light doesn't poison them; it just pierces and burns. In a city chock-full of every species of youkai there is—and run by _kitsune_ —their wounds aren't exactly a glowing neon sign pointing to you or Ruri over, well, half the people in any given supernatural line-up. As long as they aren't stupidly strong-willed, between Ruri's help and the fact they're all unconscious, messing up their memories shouldn't be too hard.

No time like the present.

"Feed chakra through your arm. I'll do the rest. I won't be explaining anything further; if you want to learn, keep up."

You feel Ruri's chakra bleeding into your body – it tastes like ice and bed-sheets between your teeth. Reaching out, you lay your other palm on the closest inugami's head, close your eyes, and let your Light slip loose. It curls around Ruri's chakra, and you let the streams sing together—all heartbeat drums and whisper-kiss strings—as they flow across down your shoulder and into your fingers.

Next, you do what you do best.

You lie.

 _Of course you never met a cute, black-haired kitsune, or got your ass kicked by the most beautiful, magnificent, and terrifying Fallen Angel you've ever seen. What about that_ blonde _bombshell, though? You know, when you were at that bar with those wonderfully cheap drinks; the busty one with the boyfriend who looked like a wimp. Yeah, you could tell she wanted a real man. Or four, because_ all _your buddies were with you. Too bad that little idiot got in the way. You fucked him up a bit, but then that psycho bitch—she wasn't even that hot, really—didn't appreciate it, pulled out five tails, and started stabbing you with them. After setting each one on fire. You hate those uppity kitsune, thinking they run this city. Lucky you found a hotel to crash at and commiserate; they were only flesh wounds, anyway. Everyone knows healers are for pussies._

Each inugami receives a similar story. You add a little more reluctance and alcohol both to the one Ruri called Takashi, just to keep him internally consistent – even if externally he was a fucking hypocrite. The rest probably aren't all the caricatures you've made them out to be either, but you're working on relatively limited information, and their own minds will fill in most of the gaps for you anyway. This, you know from experience; tonight is far from the first time you've had to clean up your own mess. Or someone else's, for that matter.

"Done," you say, relinquishing your grip on Ruri's chakra and taking a couple of deep breaths – an action she mirrors, though her own gasps for air are far harsher. Understandable; without a proper circle to guide the collaboration, just feeding you her own life-force can't have been exactly comfortable, for all that she could have cut it off at any time. "With luck, you'll never see them again."

"Thank you," she says.

"About time." You return the knives of her eyes with a glare of your own. "Oh, don't give me that look. I didn't have to help you in the first place, so be grateful."

"You said you meant that promise."

"Sure." You shrug. "Tell me again who forced me to make it."

Strangely, Ruri smirks. "Are you saying you didn't enjoy this?"

She gestures at the bed – or, more accurately, the pile of bodies on it. Her hand trembles a little, like a butterfly's wings.

"Like I said, it's been a long month." You turn away from the bed, and start toward the door. "Now hurry up. It's time to go."

"Okay," Ruri says. "But this conversation isn't over, Sabetha. You owe me more than that."

"The Hell I do."


	33. Revelations 5-1

You close another tome, running a hand through your hair.

This isn't working.

Sure, you're learning so much more about the soul than you'd ever bothered to study before, but you need something greater than what Mittelt's library can provide. It has plenty of primers, and there are a couple of journeyman texts you're yet to read – the problem is that every idea that pops into your head is well beyond 'journeyman'. Temporal analysis is exponentially more difficult the further back you look, and that's only on inanimate objects; you want to apply it to a pseudoreal shard of energy—of Light—hanging in imaginary space without targeting the rest of your soul in the process.

That's only one plan of many, and you don't even know where to start _looking_ in order to figure out if it's possible in the first place. You… you can't do this on your own. Not with a single suitcase full of books and a modest apartment as your only major resources.

The obvious answer is Azazel. If there is one single person on this Earth, or anywhere else, best suited to helping you understand every last, shimmering inch of your soul and what it carries, it's him; the Beelzebub can piss right off.

(Politely, though. If you had to choose between fighting Ajuka Beelzebub or _Sirzechs fucking Lucifer_ , you'd pick Sirzechs every time. Most people would).

But you've already decided not to go to Azazel. You need to stand on your own two feet. Find your own solutions. Be your own woman. The Grigori is there to catch you if you fall—no pun intended—but you're not interested in falling. Or failing. That means figuring out what to do without letting someone else take care of it all for you. At best, you're looking for a map, a guide, maybe even a teacher if you can bear the insult – whatever happens, the work must be _yours_.

Clearly, the next-best option would be Nabi. Whatever her personal failings, you're pretty sure she knows her shit; based on your first impressions, if she was any madder a scientist Yasaka would have had her thrown her in a sanitorium. Unfortunately, you're also pretty sure she hates you, and more importantly she's working directly alongside a bunch of your fellow Fallen. No – Nabi is out, at least for the moment.

The only other person you know in this city is Ruri, and, well, that's an issue unto itself. You've been researching for three days since the disaster in the hotel, and the last thing she said to you before you split was that she wouldn't give up just because you had, and you quote, 'a porcupine masquerading as a personality'. Impudent brat. The next time you're due to meet her is tomorrow, and you're not looking forward to turning up.

You _will_ , because you're not a coward—and, let's be honest, because she's still stupidly attractive—but she'd better not make a fucking spectacle out of it. You don't want a friend. It's not like you're grieving, exactly, but you'd be pretty angry if, right after you died, Kalawarner had hopped onto the next piece of tail that came her way to declare undying loyalty and friendship with. Ruri is—not a _tool_ , exactly, but you're after allies rather than people to wear matching t-shirts with.

That leaves… not much, exactly. There are bound to be people in Kyoto with knowledge you can borrow in some way, shape, or form. It's a scholar's haven in many ways, given the relative peace, the leylines, and the reputation of Yasaka's own research division. Nothing on the Grigori's own, of course—or, fine, Hell's—but still relatively well-respected. Unfortunately, you don't know any of those people who aren't Nabi.

Hmm. You can't ask Nabi for help, but you might be able to ask her where to _go_ for help. She'll probably answer just to get you out of her hair. Though you're not sure how reliable she would be – she made it clear she despised this city and pretty much everything in it, and that generally doesn't bode well for making connections. Still, it's something to consider.

You stand, dropping the book on the bed, and move toward the kitchen, such as it is. It looks like you're going to be in Kyoto for a while, between your research project and Ruri, and that means you ought to start treating your apartment more like a home than a hotel. The concept of going out to purchase _groceries_ is appalling domestic, but you weren't willing to make any more complex arrangements – you'd rather not trust anyone with a teleport conduit straight to your room, even one designed to transport foodstuffs and nothing else, not unless you made it yourself.

Hmm.

In the past, that sort of thing would have been beyond you, but now you have both more power to your name and the beginnings of a trick perfect for that sort of space-time manipulation. It would take some of your attention away from researching your soul, but designing your own, potentially unique teleportation circle—depending on how many other people have stumbled upon the whole mathematics thing—is not an endeavour that could ever be called a waste.

You grab a packet of noodles and start boiling a kettle.

...what?

You like things quick and easy. It's annoying enough that you have to eat at all, now that your Light alone is no longer enough to sustain you. You might have grown to enjoy the act, but that doesn't mean you don't still wish you didn't need to. There's no point in wasting time preparing some stupidly fancy meal that takes an hour and a half to make when you could be done and back to researching in five minutes. If you wanted something more complicated, you'd go out to a restaurant and let someone else do the work for you.

The kettle whistles, and you pluck a bowl from a cabinet to pour it—and the noodles—in. They'll need for to sit for a couple of minutes until they're soft; the perfect chance to think a little more about where you're going next.


	34. Revelations 5-2

**There is a slight change to canon in this chapter: ordinarily, Devils can only _speak_ all languages, not read them.**

* * *

A few minutes later, you pour the excess water down the sink, and pull a fork—chopsticks are far too much effort—out of a drawer to eat the noodles with. They're not particularly outstanding, but they're not _terrible_ , which is better than what you expected. Most of the time Dohnaseek did the cooking, at least when you ended up on the same mission, and he could pull flavour from a lump of rock. It's one of the reasons you put up with some of his other eccentricities – sure, you'll eat cup noodles if there's nobody else to give you shit about it, but it was always nice to put in less effort than even they required and still get something delicious.

Speaking of effort, you've decided where to direct yours. Your soul can keep a little longer – you don't want to lose the spark of inspiration teasing the corners of your mind, telling you that you could learn how to _teleport_ if you're clever enough with applying what you've already learned. You've seen Azazel do it, though without the circle you'll need. You have a contract from Gremory you can try to reverse-engineer something from. You know plenty of simple summoning circles, which have to open gates between planes in order to work. And you've just finished studying the basics of three-dimensional coordinate systems—cartesian, cylindrical, and spherical—as well as the relevant triple integrals to map out volumes within them.

Yes, you can work with this.

You drop your fork into the bowl, the last few noodles still wrapped around it, and toss both into the sink. Naturally, your throw is perfect.

It's time to get to work.

You walk over to your suitcase, and pull out your set of summoning reagents, a notebook, and a pen. Before you take Gremory's contract out, you reach in for a pair of gloves and slip them on. The contract is inert, but you don't want to accidentally activate it; though it might be out of range at the moment if what you know about the way these things work is true, there could still be _something_ inside it to detect someone trying to tamper with it, or indeed trying to use it to lay a trap. As painful as the admission is, the Lucifer is more cunning than you are. You failed to get out of a single city with a single Sacred Gear, and he led and won a civil war against half his entire species. To think he would permit such obvious weaknesses in a system capable of summoning his _little sister_ is the same sort of assumption that got you killed in the first place.

No – before you play with Gremory's contract, however long down the road that may be, you're going to make sure you know exactly what you're getting into. It's not paranoia if they've already got you once.

Lifting the contract up to bring the seal closer, you start to read.

The natural—as if there is anything _natural_ about a Devil—polyglot nature of Devils means they don't actually have a language to call their own. When a Devil speaks, the listener hears the words in the tongue they consider theirs, which is why you've never heard a Devil say anything that wasn't in Enochian.

(Some habits are hard to break).

Point is, this cacophony translates to Devil sorcery as well; it's hard to divorce what you speak and what you write, so most of the Devil-made or Devil-inspired rituals you've ever seen are a mismatched hodgepodge of six or seven different sets of symbols. They wouldn't even _work_ half the time, except for the fact that sometimes the circles are closer to props than anything else. The one thing of God's the Morningstar didn't cast away was the power of belief and faith—fitting, given how the Devils came to be in the first place—and that is why their sorcery is effectively 'I think, therefore I do'.

Gremory's contract, however, is one of the other half: an actually legitimate ritual. The downside of Devil sorcery is that it makes automation difficult, because if the caster doesn't think the same thoughts, feel the same feelings, and want the same wants each time they use it, they'll get different results. Sometimes the variance doesn't matter—you once saw a Devil use the same gesture four times to throw four different-coloured lightning bolts—but a lot of the time it does. Boredom is the enemy, but especially when the magic you're using is powered by imagination and your mind starts wandering in order to entertain itself.

Thus, the sort of process that Gremory requires—an identical summoning request repeated hundreds or thousands of times—can't rely on a caster in whom a minor loss of self-discipline could have consequences anywhere from mild to fatal to downright _strange_. No; the contract uses proper ritual sorcery, for all that that it still follows the general Devil convention of swapping between languages up to three or four times within a single circle. It's hard to follow, because you don't have the same advantage of instant comprehension that a Devil reading it would – you had to _learn_ all the languages you know. Most of them you've mastered, but you still have to change gears over and over sometimes within even the same sentences, and the mental fatigue soon gives you a headache.

Fucking Devils.

Eventually, you decipher what the circles are actually saying, and breathe a sigh of relief that it's over. It's a fairly simple apparatus; a trigger, tied to want, a link, tied to Gremory, and a bridge, tied to what looks like some sort of master circle. Someone touching the flyer who wants something hard enough will open a link to Gremory, who can then—presumably, based on the separation between the circles for contact and transport and their respective wordings—decide whether to follow herself or send someone else instead.

You didn't actually spot any traps or precautions in the contract, which makes you only more certain they're there. Something as potentially dangerous as this would not go unprotected. That's not important, though – not compared to the fact that Gremory's contract doesn't, strictly, summon her. As a whole, it's best described like that, and obviously was inspired by the concept, but the fact Gremory can refuse or choose who goes means she's not bound into a _genuine_ summoning contract.

It also means that the third circle—the bridge—teleports rather than calls. So if you want to design your own teleportation circle, you just need to copy the same principles behind its design. Translating it into mathematics would just be icing on the cake – given the deliciously poetic irony of stealing a trick from the Devils and making it your own.

The thought makes you smile.

You pack away your summoning reagents—you don't need them anymore, since you have something far better to reverse-engineer than a _true_ summoning—and then start to write, eyes flicking back and forth from contract to notepad. The first step is to copy the actual circle you need, rather than deal with the Hell that would be trying to isolate it amongst the others while converting it in the process. This way guarantees a lower risk of mistakes, and won't take you more than an hour to get right. After that comes the hard part; it'll take a couple of days at least, and you'll need your laptop for it. Your study over the past couple of weeks has taught you enough mathematics to know where to start, but you suspect you'll need to do a lot more research before you can generate a proper, one-to-one translation (no pun intended).

That means you'll have to meet Ruri before you're done.


	35. Revelations 5-3

**A perhaps unnecessary reminder that the opinions of characters are not necessarily the opinions of the author.**

* * *

Today, you've chosen to tutor Ruri at a coffee shop.

By chosen, of course, you mean that you were completely distracted by working on teleportation circles to the degree that when it turned time to meet her, you gave the first name off the top of your head and rushed to get there so you'd be early as usual. Image is important, especially in the face of someone you've discovered is far unrulier a brat than you first thought. You need to be in control, which is the reason why you're relaxing in a chair, coffee in your hand and your breath carefully regulated, when she arrives.

"Hello, Sabetha!" Ruri says, waving. Short sleeves, short shorts, and a short neckline as a counterpoint. You're actually impressed. She looks like any average girl dressed for a day out – minus how she strains her shirt. The only thing average about those is the way they raise it by existing. "How are you?"

"If you're expecting something like 'better now that you're here'," you reply with a lazy drawl, "I'm not feeling it right now. Be a good girl and maybe I'll change my mind later."

"Oh, you will." Ruri's grin flits across her face like a hummingbird.

You don't sigh, as much as you might want to. Unwarranted mischief and kitsune. Name a more iconic combination.

"If you're hungry, order something," you say, given the way she glances at the crumbs on your otherwise-empty plate. "The ward will keep them away once we start."

Ruri signals a waitress and places her order. That leaves the two of you with a couple of minutes to kill, and naturally she seizes the opportunity so greedily you'd think she was a Mammon. One day, you'll hunt down every person who ever suggested that the key to winning people over was persistence, and introduce them to the persistent pain of a light-spear up the ass.

"So, Sabetha, what do you do for fun?"

You ignore your first impulse— _apart from you, I assume?_ —and tap a finger against your cheek as if lost in thought. "Whatever I feel like, really."

Ruri pouts. Seriously, why has someone not tried to weaponise that? "That's not helpful! How am I supposed to know how to thank you properly for being my teacher if I don't know what you enjoy?"

"I'm sure that's why you were asking," you reply, amused. "But I wasn't lying. I didn't Fall to waste my freedom on sticking to the same old, tired entertainments for eternity. There are plenty of things I like, plenty more that I don't, and even more that I haven't got around to experiencing yet. I've been around for far too long to be worried about stupid little things like inhibitions – I'll try anything once, and I'm not just talking about sex."

"Huh." Ruri blinks, and then brightens. "That makes things easy, then!"

Her coffee and snack arrives, and she wolfs down both with an inelegance that is less and less surprising the more you learn about her. You take the opportunity to reach a hand under the table—while she's not looking and where she can't see—to activate the privacy ward. A jolt of Light triggers it, and Ruri's chewing skips a beat. As expected of a Sage, even if you weren't trying to be particularly subtle.

"Well, Ruri," you say, "what do you want to learn about today?"

"Can you tell me about God?"

The name sends a little thrill of hate through your heart. "I thought you didn't need to know about Heaven or the Church."

"Yeah, but you've _met_ him! I've never talked to someone who's talked to a god before. Besides, I know what they said about him in Russia, except that was only one side of the story. I want to hear the other."

"Fair enough," you say. "Never let it be said that I'm not willing to tell people what He's _really_ like."

You recline back in your seat, stretching like you're preparing for a race, and cross one of your legs over the other.

"So, the thing they love to tell people in church and on the street is that God is kind. They preach to high Heaven about forgiveness and love and how all your sins don't matter if only you choose to be repentant. It's even true; God is kind and loving and He _will_ forgive you your weaknesses if you're truly sorry for them. In many ways, He is the very model of magnaminty."

You smile, deep and dark.

"As long as you're human. Otherwise, too bad, you're shit out of luck. Both humans and Angels have free will, but Heaven forbid—quite literally—that _we_ use ours. People like her," you gesture to a passing waitress, "can break every rule in the Bible and still be welcomed through Heaven's gates, if they beg for the Lord's mercy and mean it out of more than just a desire to _be_ given that mercy. Hell, as long as your sins aren't particularly egregious, you don't even have to be sorry for them. God won't deny you from Heaven just for wearing wool and linen in the same outfit. Just bat your mortal eyes, smile your mortal smile, and die your mortal death. Don't worry, little ant, He's there for you.

"An Angel, on the other hand? We don't get forgiveness, or mercy, or second chances. We fuck up _once_ , and we're done. We're gone. Cast from Heaven in disgust and disgrace. There is no way back. I know people who've tried. Fallen who thought that maybe if they were good enough, God would welcome them back. Idiots.

"God doesn't believe in _good enough_. Not when it comes to us. You know, we don't believe we're going to Fall in the moment that we do. We love our Father. He loves us. He must. We are bright and burning and beautiful – if He can adore some tiny, pathetic mortal wretch, imagine what He must feel for us, the first and foremost of His children!

"What vainglorious fools we are, to believe that while our soul collapses in on itself like an imploding star, our wings char like the insides of our veins, and the clouds no longer hold our weight as we slip from God's sight. When God looks at you, it feels like you'll stop existing when He turns away – _and then He does_."

You do not flinch at the memory. It has been a long time since you were that weak.

"So we fall and Fall, discarded like unnecessary punctuation, our sentence exile for the rest of our natural lives because we _had the fucking temerity to disobey_. Not for the fifth time. Not for the third. For the _first_. I told you the Evil Pieces are slavery – congratulations, now you know who the Devils learned it from. You asked me about God, Ruri? Then remember this. He is the sort of divinity who punishes His servants for exercising the free will He never had to gift them. He is the sort of Father who loves His pets more than His own children. He is the sort of kind that all my cruelty _could never hope to match._ "

Your fingers have left dents in the table by the time you remember to loosen your grip.

"So," you say, forcing a smile, "there you go. God, through the eyes of someone who's met Him. I hope you learned something."

For a while, Ruri is silent.

"Yeah," she says eventually, "I think I did."

"Good."

"I'm sorry for asking." Her voice is as soft as sympathy.

"Fuck off, Ruri," you say, each syllable edged with bitter annoyance. "I am not some misunderstood monster who needs a pretty girl to accept them for who they are. Leave fantasies like that to the humans stupid enough to believe them. I don't want—or need—Heaven or God. I left them behind long ago, and I don't regret any of it."

You died in despair. Of your stupidity. Of your weakness. Of your _failure_.

Not of your Fall.

Ruri frowns. "You make trying to be your friend really hard, you know."

You snort. "Yeah, I've heard that one before. Any other questions?"

The rest of the day is taken up by a lengthy divergence into why the Biblical Factions as a whole are generally at odds with most others, even if they're not outright warring with anyone but themselves. Turns out even Ruri, as isolated as she is, is aware of the way groups like the Shinto view God and everything that came from him. The principle is relatively simple, even if the politics are complex: Christianity and Islam are the most dominant religions on Earth, and they have crushed hundreds—thousands—of other mythologies and religions over the years in order to get there. The Three Factions are conquerors, and that does not engender kindness.

Eventually, Ruri begs off for dinner and sleep. She invites you out to the former, but you decline. She'll have to try better than that. Besides, you have work to do.

Soon enough, you're opening the door to your apartment. The wards unfold in welcome as you step across the threshold.

Then you freeze.

"Hello, Raynare," Kokabiel says, sitting in a chair that wasn't there when you left and thumbing through a sheaf of paper. "I've heard some very interesting things about you."


	36. Revelations 5-4

"I didn't expect to see you here, my lord," you say, inclining your head. Kokabiel, unlike Azazel, prefers some small acknowledgement of his position. "I assume this is not a social visit."

Of course it isn't. Kokabiel doesn't do social, and certainly not with someone like you.

"You are correct," he says, standing. Your eyes are level with his shoulder. "Azazel told us that you survived your death, and about the discovery of the Red Dragon Emperor, but that is not why I'm here. Tell me what you know of Rias Gremory and her Peerage, from your interactions with them. I learned from Father Freed that you've had relatively extensive dealings with them compared to any of our other agents."

"...Father Freed?" you ask, venom eating through the respect Kokabiel's presence demands. "The same Father Freed who _left me to die?_ "

Kokabiel's wings—they spring from his back in all their glory, like flags planted over a conquered castle, as they have every time you've ever seen him—still from their lazy flexing. "Oh?"

"Freed Sellzen could have saved me from Gremory," you say, "but he laughed in my face and demanded that I _fuck_ him for the favour. I refused, and he ran."

"He did not mention that to me." Kokabiel's voice is mild. His eyes are not. "Rest assured I will explain to the good Father that—as a human and Stray Exorcist—it is his _duty_ to obey his betters."

"Thank you, my lord," you say, hiding your smile. You've seen how Kokabiel treats disobedient Fallen. You're almost not sure you want to see how he'll treat a disobedient human. Only almost, though. Freed Sellzen can _burn_. "May I ask why you want to know about Gremory and her tools?"

"You may not," he says. Well then. "When stepping close to the sisters of Satans, some secrets are necessary."

There's something a little off about this – Kokabiel didn't have to come in person. He could have just requested a report, whether through Azazel or on his own initiative. Sabbatical or not, there's a limit to the sort of person you can refuse direct orders from. You can't imagine he doesn't have better things to do than talk to you, regardless of how _interesting_ you are. And you're not sure why he wants to know about Gremory in the first place.

At the end of the day, however, there's nothing you can do about it, and you certainly have little reason to be obstinate. Kokabiel is standing _right in front of you_ , he's made it clear he won't tolerate questions like that—you can understand the motive behind it, at least—and it's not really your place to ask them in the first place. Azazel is a scientist, and he welcomes inquiring minds; Kokabiel is a soldier, and he welcomes obedience.

"Would you like to know about the way they fight first, the way they interact with one another, or something else?" You didn't see all that much of them, for the most part, but you'll do your best.

"I don't care about the way they fight," he says. You can hear the unspoken reprimand; as if someone like Kokabiel is concerned by the strengths and weaknesses of a rabble of children he could crush with a hand behind his back. "Tell me of their connections. Their relationships. Their vulnerabilities."

The first thing you relay to him is the obvious: Gremory is incredibly defensive of her Peerage, as her family has always been. When you mention that her Queen is called Akeno, Kokabiel laughs, but ignores the question in your expression. You speak of the way the Knight expressed a particular hatred of priests, and how he and the Rook fought so eagerly alongside Hyoudou. That diverts into a tangent about the brat's almost-obsession with Argento, another name Kokabiel recognises. You don't know for certain if Gremory resurrected the girl, but you'd be an idiot to believe she didn't. The last thing you mention is, of course, Hyoudou's general perversion – it's the most obvious weakness he has, and one the Fallen are very good at exploiting.

You don't offer suggestions, only facts and observations. You're a footsoldier. Kokabiel is a general. If he wanted your input, he'd ask for it. The insult by implication is one you find you care less about now than you used to – you _are_ weak. You _were_ a fool. So what if the slight still burns? Wallowing in bitterness got you exactly two thousand years of _fucking nowhere_ , and Kokabiel is certainly the wrong direction to channel your rage.

One day, you'll look down on him from Azazel's side—and Shemhazai's—but there are far better and more deserving targets for your hate. Like that bitch of a Devil Kokabiel is asking you another question about.

"Rias Gremory," he says. "Did she seem _particularly_ fond of any members of her Peerage?"

"Hyoudou," you reply. Kokabiel's questions are… suspicious, but the sort of suspicious that would spread your smile shark-wide under any other circumstance. You doubt he wants to avenge your death with fire and Light, not unless he's planning to doom the rest of your species, but there are plenty of other ways to fuck with Gremory. As long as there's something left for your own vengeance at the end, you could care less. "The last thing she ever said to me was a warning not to flirt with her 'cute servant'. Dohnaseek reported that she came to defend Hyoudou when he stumbled on the boy in the city, and she permitted her entire Peerage to come and try to rescue Argento. Beyond those specifics, her general behaviour implied a strange level of affection for him before she even knew he had the Boosted Gear, and no doubt she holds him all the more precious now."

"How interesting," Kokabiel says. His voice is distant, as if he's lost in thought. "Well done, Raynare. Your information has been… revealing."

"I hope it proves useful for your purposes, my lord."

He smiles, amused. "It will."

Kokabiel sits down, lounging in the chair the way a wolf might. You'd take your own seat, but he hasn't given you permission, and even if it's your apartment, you're not the one in control – of the room _or_ the conversation.

"Indulge me for a moment, Raynare. What do you think of the Great War? The second, not the first. You may speak freely."

For most people, there is only one Great War, when all three Factions strove to leave nothing left of the others but the stench of their corpses. For those as old as you and Kokabiel, however, there was another – when the Morningstar revealed what he had done and declared his defiance of Heaven over the body of Israfil himself. Most history books nowadays refer to it as the Secession, the Rebellion, or even the Origin, but pretty names paid for by Devils aren't worth the breath it takes to say them.

"We should have allied with Heaven," you reply, and Kokabiel raises an eyebrow. "Together we could have _crushed_ the Devils—scoured them to salt and ash—and then turned on God in the aftermath. It's not as if _Angels_ would have been willing to betray us first; they'd have expected treachery, but the timing would have been ours to decide."

He chuckles. "Just the answer I'd have expected from a spy."

You can't tell if that's a compliment or an insult.

"May I ask why we chose not to, my lord?"

"Azazel was never interested in winning," he says. He stands with the lazy grace of a flourished blade, and picks up the papers he'd left on your bed; they disappear with a twist of his wrist. "Just surviving."

"It's a noble goal." Azazel has always been concerned for the welfare of those under his aegis. He's too kind for his own good, sometimes. "God never cared for us half as much."

"Noble," Kokabiel says, musing. "Yes, I suppose it would be to someone like you."

Before you can reply, he speaks again.

"Your assistance is appreciated, Raynare, but I have business to attend to. Goodbye."

"...I assume you don't want the chair, my lord?"

He glances down at it. "I do not. This apartment needs more furniture. No Fallen should live somewhere so… plain."

With that, he takes a step and disappears in a blaze of Light.


	37. Revelations 5-5

_Well,_ you think, _that was a thing_.

You've received more personal attention—unless mission assignments count—from the most important members of the Grigori in the past three weeks than you had in the past three _centuries_ before then. No wonder you were never noticed in the past, if it takes surviving your own death in order to become someone. Clearly you should try it again, just to see if you'll get a posthumous promotion or something this time around.

Shaking your head, you fetch your notes and pen. As always, there's much to be done – and while you might have plenty of time to do it in, you've already fallen into that trap once. The temptation still lingers beneath your thoughts, however; indolence is the ground state of most Fallen, and that means you need as much momentum as you can get. Hopefully there won't be too many more distractions between you and finishing off the first draft of your teleportation circles.

You decide to test out the chair Kokabiel left; you wish he hadn't been quite so rude about it, but it's true that you haven't got around to sprucing this place up yet. Soft black cushions, thick armrests, and, yes, a button to recline and kick out a footrest. You sit down, and for a moment all you can think is _floof_. What the fuck. How is it _possible_ to be this comfortable?

Okay. Kokabiel can insult your living standards all he wants if he'll give you more chairs like this because _God in Heaven_ you're not even sure you'd get out of it if Azazel asked you. While naked.

You lounge there for half an hour or so, drowning in relaxation, before you come to a horrifying realisation. This chair is _too_ comfortable. You can't do any work like this; right now, you barely feel like doing anything at all.

You're going to have to _get up_.

This, beyond anything else, is true proof that the universe hates you.

Standing—slowly, regretfully—you move to your bed, stretch out, and start to write. It is, of course, entirely accidental that you're looking out the window and not toward the chair when you continue where you left off with your translation.

The rest of the night—and the following day—drifts away under the smooth strokes of your pen; you change positions on the covers so many times you stop counting, have to consult Dohnaseek's laptop three times an hour, and give thanks for Fubini's theorem every five minutes. Sometimes you are perfectly silent except for the soft susurration of pages beneath ink; others you curse profusely as you tear ten out in a row and start again.

Slowly, like you're trying to unravel the Gordian knot with nothing but a needle held between your teeth, a pattern emerges. Gremory's circle was inscrutable, switching between too many different languages and relying on a few too many unfamiliar principles that you can copy but not _understand_ – but your own is unfolding like a flower before the sun.

You fill out three lines, your thoughts chorusing _of course!_ instead of _why?_

Another thirty follow, and you can _see_ the final shape as a shadow across your mind. Your hand is a blur across the paper. You just need to define _this_ variable and calculate the probability that it will be _here_ and use that to determine the expected value of the tolerances for _this_ and your will be _done_.

Strewn across your bed are twenty-something pages of equations – only a few actually matter, the rest part of the journey but not the destination. You gather them up, your fingers shaking from the strain. You've been writing so much for so long—even with swapping between hands every now and then—that you can barely tell you've dropped the pen; your wrists feel like somebody replaced your bones with broken glass. Your throat is dry, and you have to look down to make sure there's not a hole in your stomach.

You don't care.

You pick up the pen, ignoring the numbing agony in your joints and the ache of your hunger, and free-hand a perfect circle from memory onto a fresh page. It seems fitting. Variables and definitions and equations spiral in from the edge of the circumference to the center – and then you repeat the process on another page.

You sit both on your kitchen bench and draw your ritual knife from the sheath on your hip. It gleams in your grip like a shard of sharpened sunlight. One quick cut across the Ring of Saturn on your palm—an act of defiance—lets you drip a line of star-bright blood across each circle. Against all odds, the paper does not burn; you seep your Light through each glittering drop, and so they instead fall into the ink, tracing each symbol in white fire like the edges of an eclipse.

The first circle, you leave on the bench while you wait for your skin to heal – the second, you move to the floor afterward. You return briefly to your suitcase to fetch a coin from Kalawarner's wallet, and set it in the centre of the circle on the floor.

You inhale, drawing Light as well as air, and clap your hands.

The Earth does not move.

The coin, however, _does_.

There is no great fanfare. No blinding flare of light or Light. Just a soft, subtle sound, like the whisper of a breeze, as one moment the coin is on the floor and the next it is on the table.

Triumph wells in your breast, a surging, exultant tide. You feel like you're flying.

 _This_ is the proof that you can be greater than you were. You could never make teleportation work, before. Too weak and too stupid. But you've done it. You've _fucking done it_. Part of you wishes God wasn't dead, just so He could witness you in the moment of your glory and realise He was _wrong_ to make you so small.

You want to drag Ruri into your bed—better, your _chair_ —and not leave until tomorrow. You want to clap your hands again and again and watch as the coin skips between the circles – so you do, laughing. You want to call Mittelt and shove your success in her face. Who's the better ritual sorcerer _now_ , huh?

But you can't.

You clap one final time, and the coin settles back onto the floor.

Wherever she is, she'd better be _fucking jealous_.

You take a couple of steps forward to gather up the circles and collapse.

Vaguely, you realise you were only standing through determination and exhilaration. You poured so much power into testing the teleporters over and over that your soul is little more than a sparking ember, the bones of your hands feel like blades plunged into your skin, and you haven't eaten in almost thirty-six hours – or eaten anything of _substance_ in closer to seventy-two.

This is… probably bad.

You're having a hard time mustering up any concern, though.

The floor is soft.

You think you'll just lay

here

a wh—

 _Angels, Fallen or otherwise, do not sleep._

They can, however, pass out.


	38. Revelations 5-6

_—_ _ile._

Your eyes open blearily, like you're trying to lift the sky with each eyelid. Blinking laboriously to clear them reveals that somebody or something has rotated your apartment a full ninety degrees. And removed the floor, because you're not standing on anything.

It takes you a while to realise this is because you're not standing in the first place.

You push yourself up, each movement an exercise in lethargy, and cough as the desert of your throat makes itself known alongside the battleaxe somebody has taken to your insides. You glance down; no, that's actually just your stomach protesting your hunger. It groans so loudly you're surprised your whole body doesn't shake. Though, given the way your head feels as if you tried to tattoo every inch of your skull with a dagger, maybe it did and you just can't concentrate enough to tell.

You stumble toward your kitchen, not so much walking as falling carefully forward. God. The last time you passed out—only a couple of decades ago—you woke up with the _good_ kind of ache. The only good thing about _this_ time is that you're not surrounded by sweat.

It takes a couple of swipes to actually flip on the tap, and you forgo a glass just to shove your head under the spray and swallow it down. Dignity is for people who can feel their legs. Thirty seconds later, you nudge the water off, and wipe the spillage from your chin. A thunderous grumble reminds you that you are almost literally starving, and you ease the pantry open to reveal a horde of cup noodles and a single packet of biscuits.

Okay. Fuck that, you need to get this living shit _sorted out_. At the very least, you have teleportation circles—the thought is a thrill of glory in your bones—you can adjust the security of yourself, and you're pretty sure you can hypnotise a few mortals working at some grocery store to… _donate_ produce into one of those circles once every week or so.

You tear open the packet of biscuits and start shovelling them into your mouth. It's not elegant, but when your Light feels like a flickering candle rather than a star in miniature, you have more important things to worry about. You spent so much on fucking around with your circles that you came close to risking discorporation. Without any way to get energy back that didn't involve spending some in the first place, it would have been an awkward—perhaps the largest understatement you've ever made—couple of days while you waited for your soul to recover enough to let you reform a body.

You… can't actually remember the last time you heard of a Fallen Angel losing control of their physical form, which makes you think you might have gone a _little too far_ with the whole Azazel impression. Just possibly.

The biscuits are dry, but you need something for your body to start metabolising as Light, and cup noodles take too long. You'll go out for a proper meal as soon as you believe you can actually survive the walk. Looking around at the rest of your apartment—slowly, so as not to provoke the wrath of your headache—Kokabiel's words come back to you: honestly, the pantry should be the _least_ of your concerns. Two months ago, you'd never have been caught dead in a place as bare as this.

Hmm.

Perhaps that's not quite the right phrasing, anymore.

Point is, the only things you can see that come up to your standards are the bed, the posters, and Kokabiel's chair. Well, the bed and the posters come up to them. The chair _redefines_ them. Hell, if you had no other reason to refurbish your apartment, you'd almost feel obliged to do it just not to insult that chair. You haven't even unpacked your suitcase yet, let alone actually gone to buy anything more than what's absolutely necessary. That needs to change.

You will need to get another chair, though, as well as a desk. You need somewhere to sit down and actually _work—_ your bed is comfortable, but writing on a soft surface is not—and Kokabiel's chair is far too comfortable to do anything that requires effort in. Even your success-addled dreams about enjoying it with Ruri mostly consisted of you sitting in it like an empress while she knelt before you and paid homage. No; if you want to get anything done except yourself, that chair is not an option.

All of these, though, are things you can worry about once you've found a restaurant and ordered their entire fucking menu, because God dammit you're still stupidly hungry.

You make your way gingerly to your suitcase, stripping off your days-old clothes. Thankfully, you've recovered enough strength to spare the Light to scour your skin clean, so you clean yourself off and don a long, loose dress the colour of your eyes. Well, the colour of Raven Black's eyes, anyway. You're too lazy for underwear today – or socks for that matter, which is why you select a pair of sandals that aren't too complicated to tie up.

Properly attired—for boring, human society anyway—you take Kalawarner's wallet from the bedside table, and for once your own as well. Azazel already knows you're alive, as does Kokabiel and the rest of the Cadre, and nobody else would have cared enough to find out you'd died in the first place. Accessing your own accounts isn't going to throw up any red flags, and self-sufficiency was supposed to be part of the point of coming to Kyoto in the first place. You might as well use your own money to outfit your own apartment.

You consider constructing the teleportation array you're planning to make the supply arrangements for, but honestly it took you five minutes to put on a dress when you once had to do the same with a bag over your head and a dagger in your thigh—long story—and you did it in half that time. Perhaps attempting something substantially more complicated should wait.

Navigating the stairs proves a frustratingly complex endeavour—you have _wings_ and it still feels like you're going to trip down them at times—but eventually you make it out of the apartment complex and into Kyoto. In deference to your current vulnerability, you've taken one of the teleportation circles you made last night with you; the other is sitting on your bed to provide an emergency exit. Being so weak is… irritating, but you're carrying the proof that it was fucking _worth it_ in the inside pocket of your dress, so you don't quite feel like slamming your head against a nearby lamp-post in despair.

You still almost do, of course, because you lost track of your surroundings in your introspection, but whatever.

The restaurant you choose is nothing fancy – it's just the first place you found that had a buffet. By the time you leave, you've eaten enough by yourself to force them to restock every single dish they had available, and probably drunk an equivalent volume of water. Mathemagics—and if that isn't a sign you've overworked yourself, you don't know what would qualify—is hard work. You suspect the proprietors are glad to see you go, but they can fuck off. Don't serve a buffet if you're not prepared for somebody to actually eat it, idiots.

Your headache has mostly faded by now, which is convenient given what your next step is: hypnotising the staff in a small grocery store—too much oversight in the larger ones—to place a selection of, well, pretty much everything they have in one of their back rooms at a specific time every week. Your Light slides in more easily than ever before, and you run the fingertips of your will across the surface of their minds, nudging an impulse here and suppressing another there. The actually complicated part is next – drawing and activating a fresh circle to link another up to later.

In the end, it takes you four hours, but as the last few lines of the last few equations fade into the floor, you feel much better than you did when you woke up. Your Light has replenished significantly, your limbs no longer feel like somebody tied anchors to your bones, the dull ache in your hands is long gone, and you've secured a supply of something better than shitty noodles and shittier biscuits.

No doubt the cooking is going to be irritating to get used to—usually other people do it for you—but on the plus side it gives you an actual excuse to take a break every so often from your research, which is something you clearly need.

Speaking of things you clearly need, it's time to go _furniture shopping_. What joy.

The rest of your day is spent slipping in and out of stores in the general vicinity of your apartment, carting bags full of various things—when what you've bought can fit into a bag in the first place, that is—there, unpacking and arranging them, and then heading out to fetch something new. You can't even teleport anything back, because you'd rather not create a pile of random shit on top of your bed. Especially when, if you're not careful, you might end up attempting to transport something into something else, and that never ends well.

Eventually, _finally_ , your work is done. Your apartment has proper curtains, proper chairs, a proper desk, you've partially unpacked your suitcases—plural because you sort of packed Kalawarner's _inside_ Mittelt's—into new closets and drawers and various things, and generally you're no longer living like that time you had to pretend to be in college.

All that remains is setting up the other half of the teleportation circle you left at the grocery store, and then you can move on to reinforcing your apartment's defences.


	39. Revelations 5-7

You etch the last few equations into the top of your kitchen bench, and press a Light-filled palm against the centre of the circle that contains them. You can feel the metaphysical shudder as it connects with its partner at the grocery store, and you smile. That's that taken care of.

Now, of course, comes something even more important. You have a basic series of privacy wards—enhanced by Azazel in a couple of ways you're aware of and likely a couple you're not—and that's it. Kyoto has turned from a temporary stop-over to a… perhaps not a _permanent_ base, but at least somewhere you don't plan on leaving in the near future. The same applies to your apartment. Now that you've made it worth living in, it's time to ensure you'll actually be able to do that without unfortunate interruptions.

The first step is investigating your current wards. If you're going to blend together an array, you don't want conflict or crossover; you're not in any position to craft redundancies, as they'd make the array far too heavy, so to speak, for your purposes. There's a careful balance between secrecy and strength when it comes to warding, and in a city like Kyoto, you're more interested in the former than the latter. It's not very likely that someone will attack you out of nowhere, but it _is_ possible that you'll attract the attention of a nosy fox. Or, well, _more_ nosy foxes.

Point is, it's time to see what Azazel has done.

You step over to the door, closing your eyes and opening your mind to your wards. Light spills into the wardspace—there's no need for caution, Azazel would never do anything to hurt you—as you listen to the songs their shadows sing. You hear the whispers of _look away, don't care, it's not important_ from your original array – but they're stronger now, greater than anything you've ever made. No doubt Azazel had something to do with that. Next is the bright, vibrant bell of the communication seal. After it comes a low, dull _thrum,_ like someone's compressed the air and started to squeeze. You follow the sound to walls of force tucked inside walls of plaster and brick, strengthening them against assault. Not your work either, but you're thankful for it all the same.

The last thing you hear is muffled – the clank of chains in distant rooms, the choked gasp of words into a gag. A barrier ward, to prevent passage. Azazel truly is thoughtful; you can experiment more wildly now, without risking alerting anyone who might be listening.

Hmm.

Unfortunately, that also means while you can teleport things _within_ your apartment, you'll need to add an exception if you want your deliveries to actually arrive. You don't have the power or skill to simply smash or slip through a barrier like the one your current wards are generating, even if Azazel and Kokabiel certainly do. The only reason you'd expect they'd notice it is because the former set it up and the latter is far too experienced to miss it.

The good news is that, apart from adding that exception, you don't really have a lot more to _do_. A detection ward to tell you if anyone's in your apartment when you're outside it, or nearby when you're inside it—you'd rather not be surprised by someone with more hostile intentions than Azazel or Kokabiel—and maybe something a little more active if you can think of anything worth risking in such a fragile, mortal-made building. Beyond those, you already have a very respectable array, at least for someone of your strength and skills.

Best get to it, then.

You extend a hand, bleeding Light across the room as it sinks into your teleportation circle. It feels strange; as you've said before, it's like stretching a limb you don't have. Your Light doesn't leave traces in the air—you're not exactly reaching through anywhere contiguous with reality—but you know where it moves, the same way you know where your arm is even if you tuck it behind your back. The connection snaps into place with a sparking crackle in your mind, and you return your attention to the wardspace.

Azazel's work is a thing of beauty; no wasted words, individual symbols where you'd use full sentences even now, and yet you can comprehend them in their entirety all the same. It honestly compares to art; a painting you can appreciate but never quite replicate. You suspect he knew you were going to look at them at some stage – you've seen other wards he's made, and they are as deliberately incomprehensible as the tendency of humans to believe they actually matter.

As such, it's relatively easy to weave the thread of Light from your teleport circles into the barrier ward. Unlike most wards, barriers are _designed_ to be adjusted, because it's very rare that someone wants to actually seal off an area of space against anything and everything.

You almost feel ashamed to be ruining Azazel's work with your own—no matter how carefully you craft it—but you don't have a choice. You mouth an apology regardless.

The last few strands of Light stitch into place beneath the needle of your will, and you start etching the necessary symbols into the wardstone Azazel anchored it on. You can't use mathematics for this; you don't know how, and the rest is in Enochian besides. You must look like quite a sight, with your arms disappearing past your elbows into a door that's only as thick as your wrist.

With the magical—and literal—equivalent of a full stop, the exception is complete. You can now be delivered food without either circle exploding. Or worse. Hooray!

You extract your arms, and your Light, from the wardspace and stop by your bed to collect your reagents from your suitcase. While you've unpacked it for the most part, there are some things you're not particularly keen on leaving lying around in the open.

You think you'll go for the detection ward first; the active defensive ward is more a bonus than anything else. That means you need, let's see… a shard of glass, a wardstone, and nothing else. Easy. You collect both and move on.

Setting the wardstone on your desk, you start to carve the necessary circles on its smooth, marble surface with your ritual knife. You work in silence; the blade in your hand is so sharp it's almost like it cuts apart the sound alongside the stone. As you work, each flick of your wrist so rote you could do it with your eyes closed, you wonder – what sort of active defence could you erect? You have too little talent in evocation to make a proper lightning trap—you've seen Baraqiel in two wars, you know which element you fear the most—and it's probably a bad idea to use one in a public building like this anyway. A summoning trap would be even worse than an evocation one in that regard. The same for anything kinetic.

No: you need something more subtle.

Oh.

Of _course_.

You don't have one idea for an active ward – you have two. The first is simple; you've been playing around with telepathy a lot recently, and you think you could generate a pain trap. Something that, when triggered—by an unwary enemy or your own will—would flood the target with agony, with knives ripping from their skin and fire flaring in their bones. The second is a _teleport_ trap, probably on the floor in front of your door. Anyone in the vicinity of the teleport trap would be trying to resist the effect while under attack from the pain trap. Not a particularly easy task, unless they're so strong you'd never beat them anyway, in which case what does it matter? It wouldn't be as useful as the pain trap, since it'd rely on the victim being in the right physical position, but it wouldn't be _useless_ either, and the combination is enticing. It's not like you couldn't use the practice anyway.

Your hands still, and you realise you've finished modifying the wardstone – now you need to finish the job. You carry it—and the shard of glass—over to the door, and reach into the wardspace with your Light. This will take some effort; you need to leave space open in the last circle to link up your active defenses to the detection array, or else there won't be anything _active_ about them. With a physical hand, you pick up the wardstone, and place it in the void as you start weaving your Light around it with hands of a far more immaterial sort. Your breath picks up as you work, and your eyes narrow in concentration.

The shard of glass you leave for last, breaking it over and over between your fingers to sprinkle the dust around the circle. Glass is a universal medium through which to see, and it is that property you wish to imbue in your ward to fully tie it to its purpose. You suppose you're giving the wrong impression of what's actually happening; unlike the wardstones, the glass dust sort of… stops existing when it crosses the line between realspace and wardspace. But the _concept_ remains, and that's the important part of something like this.

Eventually, you're done, and you let your Light go, breathing heavily. Time to take a break; you've been at this for several hours if you count finishing the teleport circle for your food deliveries, and you don't want to overwork yourself into unconsciousness again anytime soon. You don't have any _active_ defences up yet, but you've finished everything else, and you suspect those will take you through the night and into the next morning. You have enough pattern recognition to recognise the path that's leading you down.

You still have your wallets on you, and you're already dressed so as not to offend any tiny mortal sensibilities, so you just lock up the wards and room both and leave. The night breeze tastes like asphalt and smog as it swirls around your dress. A flush of Light pulses away the cold, and you stroll toward somewhere you spotted a week or so earlier; a French place by the name of _Restaurant MAEKAWA_ —yes, the capitalisation is necessary—only a couple of blocks north of Ruri's own.

You're halfway there when the girl herself comes sprinting toward you. Her clothes look like she's been wrestling with a hurricane, and she's—she's _crying?_ Tears constellate on her eyelashes, and her face is a smudged, blotchy mess. She barrels toward you, desperation in every half-stumbling step, and you have to catch her arms to stop her from crashing into you. It was that or move aside, and you're not _that_ cruel.

(Well, you are. Just not to pretty people you're still interested in).

"They killed my sister!" Each syllable is a tear-soaked sob. "Sabetha _they killed my sister!_ "

 _What._

You look around. Everyone on the street is very conspicuously not looking at Ruri, and though none of them are close enough to hear her, you need to go elsewhere. There's a park nearby, on the bank of the river. That'll do.

"Ruri," you say, handling each word like another would porcelain, "we have to move. We can't talk here."

"I don't care!" She's not so much yelling as _howling_. "Nabi is dead! _She's dead and it's all their_ —"

Enough of this. Your palm cracks out against her cheek, hard enough that a handprint blooms across her skin like fire. She stumbles, but your grip on her other arm keeps her upright. Before she recovers, you grasp her shoulders and pull her toward you.

"And if _you_ keep screaming it to high Heaven," you hiss, "we'll _both_ be dead, and it'll be all _your_ fault. I don't care if you saw Yasaka herself ripping your sister's liver out, accusing the rulers of this city—of any city—of murder for the whole world to hear generally ends in _more_ murder. You said she was important, and they still killed her, so what do you think they might do to _us_ if you don't _shut up?_ "

Ruri glares at you, which is probably deserved. It's irritating to you as well, having to resort to something so clichéd as slapping the hysterics out of someone, but it's a cliché because it works. You'll deal with this properly when you're somewhere else; you don't actually expect a kitsune hit squad to descend on you out of nowhere, but sometimes hyperbole is the only way to get through to people.

Thankfully, she doesn't protest when you start tugging her toward the park. The whole way, she never lets go of your hand; though that's partly because you won't let her. She might try to run off, and you need to get to the bottom of this for your sake as well as hers. There's a very obvious reason for a group of kitsune to kill Nabi, and you're not entirely uninvolved with it.

You sit Ruri down on the bench, muttering a privacy spell under your breath. Nowhere near as effective as a ward, but you don't have the time for that.

"Okay," you say. " _What the fuck happened?_ "

Haltingly, Ruri begins her story. Every second sentence, or word in some cases, is interrupted by tears.

She'd decided to find her sister after work, since Nabi—you pretend this is the second time you've ever heard that name—had been spending a lot of time out and about, and was only rarely home. It didn't take too long to find her – Ruri says her senjutsu isn't particularly long-ranged for the most part, but she's _very_ familiar with her sister, and she can track her halfway across the city.

"Is that how you found me?" you ask.

Ruri nods, and continues.

After she sensed Nabi, she caught a bus closer to save a walk. Using senjutsu for that long was dangerous; she cut the connection the moment she located Nabi and felt the echo of her surroundings. There weren't many abandoned churches in Kyoto, and Ruri had looked up their locations after she met you. Once the bus arrived, she made her way through the last few streets to the church.

There must have been a barrier up or something to keep the mortals out, because one moment everything was fine, and the next—as she crossed the spiritual edge of the church's grounds—there was fire and blood and _silence_. She saw Fallen Angels in pieces on the ground, recognisable only by the spray of feathers surrounding them, and Nabi missing an arm but still fighting. Other bodies lay on the ground, too charred for her to tell what they were.

Ruri breaks down at this point, and after a couple of seconds, you eventually opt to awkwardly wrap an arm around her back. You've had to comfort people before, but it's been a very long time since you had to do the same for someone you actually gave even a single fuck about – it feels odd. She sobs into your shoulder, and you find yourself stroking her hair.

Eventually, she speaks again.

Ruri ran toward Nabi and whoever she was fighting—they were moving too fast to see—but she hadn't made it halfway there before Nabi tried to do _something_ with the hand that wasn't there, and a claw ripped out her throat through the resultant opening.

It takes several minutes for Ruri to speak again, and when she does, her voice is so raw a mix of pain and despair and _fury_ it feels like a blade in your ear.

"I saw him, Sabetha. I _saw him_. He had six tails. The same robes as the priests of the Yasaka shrine. And he looked at me and _laughed_ before running away. I chased him but he was too fast; he met up with someone carrying a load of papers and something that hurt my eyes to look at—like I was staring at the sun—and they disappeared."

Her hands fist in your dress, and you feel flames against your skin. You have to shove Ruri away before she sets the rest of you alight, but she doesn't seem to notice.

"They took my sister." When her eyes open, her gaze seems as vast and empty as the night, and she speaks in a voice not entirely her own; it echoes and warps, each word repeated a heartbeat after the first. "I'm goi—I'm goi—"

Her foxfire snuffs out, and she collapses into your lap.

Thankfully, she seems to still be breathing.


	40. Revelations 5-8

You know what Ruri will ask you when she wakes.

She didn't hide away, or rush to the shrine, or charge up the steps of Yasaka's palace. She came to _you._ You are the port she chose in what—you presume—is the worst storm she's ever known. The implication is obvious; she wants your help. She may not even realise it yet, given you're fairly sure she doesn't _have_ anyone else to turn to, but the moment her wits return, you suspect the first words out of her mouth will be related to vengeance, and eventually how you can assist with it.

You don't blame her. It's a feeling you're intimately familiar with.

But the question remains: do you _want_ to?

Obviously you'll tell Azazel what happened. If he doesn't know already, he'll want to, and Ruri indicated that the whole contingent he sent was slaughtered. It sounds like the fight wasn't totally one-sided, since Ruri distinguished feathered corpses from others, but that's still a half-dozen or so Fallen lost. You won't miss Abathar, but you don't know who else was with him; you've shared drinks and sometimes more with plenty of your fellows over the years, and even if there's a level of mutual not-giving-a-fuck between most members of the Grigori—the ones who don't despise you, at least—there are still… acquaintances, you guess, who you'd prefer alive to dead.

Beyond that, though, you don't owe Ruri, or Nabi's memory, anything. By the sounds of it, you're up against anywhere from a six-tails and some unknown accomplice to the whole of Kyoto's leadership. The latter seems highly unlikely—in a thousand years Yasaka has never indicated she wants to start a war with anyone, let alone a faction as relatively uninvolved as the Grigori—but you can't discount _somebody_ important ordering the hit.

Of course, the former seems just as unlikely – anyone with enough power and pull to mount an assault on a Fallen-held church and win would surely have more allies than whoever they lost in the attack and the one they ran away with. And it's not like you could take a _lone_ six-tails in open combat in the first place, discounting whoever they had with them at the time.

No: you have more than enough reasons to stay as uninvolved as you can.

Why, then, do you feel so _absolutely sure_ that when Ruri asks, you'll say yes?

You—fine, you like her. She's beautiful when she isn't trying, and adorable when she is. And she isn't a total wet blanket like most of your mortal conquests, too scared of losing you to be _interesting_ beyond a night or two; Ruri's just the right mix of obstinate and easily led to make things fun.

But she's not unique. Not the way Kalawarner was. Ruri offers nothing you haven't seen before or won't see again. Nothing worth dying for. You'd prefer a world with Ruri in it than one without, but not as much as one with _you_ in it.

You wouldn't just abandon her out of hand, but the most logical thing to do with that in mind is to help her from afar; offer her a place to stay, perhaps, your assistance with any sorcery she might require, and a mind to bounce her plans for vengeance—you know she'll have them, you don't go senjutsu-mad in an instant because you're thinking _peaceful_ thoughts—off. Satisfy the letter and not the spirit, the way all the best lies do.

But then you'd just be running, wouldn't you?

The grand sum of your accomplishments— _yours_ , not gifted to you by some broken remnant of God—since your rebirth is reverse-engineering a teleport circle. You're supposed to be after power. Strength. _Worth_. Take Kokabiel, as an example. His name is carved into the stars themselves. Nobody's going to remember a girl who could teleport a little – no matter how proud _you_ are of yourself.

Caution is all well and good, but you can't hide forever. You don't learn to win by not playing. So what if you can't take a six-tails in a fair fight? That'll just make it all the more impressive – even if you're going to stay as far away from _fair_ as possible. It's time you faced the truth: you're not a hammer. You're never going to smash apart a battlefield by existing. You've spent your whole life as a dagger pretending to be a broadsword, and—fittingly—you've always come up short.

It doesn't mean you're always going to be weak.

You just have to reconsider what it means to be strong.

And part of that means playing to your _own_ strengths.

Thus, Ruri.

Of course you'll help her.

Not just because you're—somewhat—fond of her, not just because it's what Azazel would do in your position, but also because it's time you did something that _mattered_. Something that will be _remembered_ by anyone other than yourself. By Ruri, by Azazel, by the friends and family of the Fallen who died – and by the killers you catch along the way.

You don't say murderers because this isn't just a murder. It's theft, too. You'd bet your right arm those papers were Nabi and the Grigori's notes on the extraction process, and the way Ruri described the other thing the accomplice was holding sounded suspiciously like she was talking about the unbound Gear itself.

Hmm. You sense an opportunity, there.

Back to the point. At the very least, you'll be up against a kitsune—in his own city—who could break you over his knee. Probably more than that. That means a lot of looking before you leap. But you've been playing these games for two thousand years. You can handle this.

(That's what you thought about Hyoudou, and Argento too. But you're smarter now. Wiser. You can do this.

You _can_ ).

On your knee, Ruri stirs. She pushes herself up, slowly, gingerly, like if she moves too fast the world will turn out to be real.

"Sabetha," she says, blinking away sleep and tears both. Her voice is raw, and as soft as a sigh. "What—what do I do? I want…"

Fire flares between her fingers.

"I want to _kill him_."

You reach out, placing both hands on her shoulders and drawing her closer.

"Good," you say. "Hold onto that feeling. Cherish it. It will give you purpose."

You pat her back.

"Don't worry. I'll help you."


	41. Hunting 6-1

"Y—you will?" Ruri's eyes widen.

"Of course," you say. "If there's one thing in this world I understand, it's hatred. And what sort of teacher would I be if I let you go hunting for vengeance unaccompanied?"

"Shouldn't you be trying to talk me out of it?"

You cock your head to the side. "I don't see why."

"That's what they do in the stories."

"The stories can go fuck themselves. If someone hurts you—if they take one of the only things you've ever cared for in this whole Goddamn world—you don't sit back and _hide_. You hunt them down and you _hurt them back_. Doesn't matter if it takes sixty seconds or sixty years. You've read the scripture, haven't you? 'But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.' That's just it works."

Ruri doesn't smile. But there's an edge in her eyes that wasn't there before. Good. She'll need it.

"I don't know how to feel. I don't know _what_ I'm feeling." Her voice is quiet and still, like the surface of a lake. Even you can't quite tell what's going on underneath. "I want to cry and run and fight and burn all at once. When I listen to the world, all I can hear is screaming. I haven't had the time to miss her but I never thought I would this much. I thought I knew what it meant to be alone but now I _am_ —and you probably don't care at all. We're not friends. I'm just your silly little student who had nowhere else to go."

There are a lot of ways you could say this. You could lie, you could sympathise, you could blow it off entirely. You could even mock. But none of them seem quite right.

"Do I care about your sister as a person? Obviously not. You couldn't expect me to," you say eventually. It's true regardless of whether or not Ruri knows you've actually _met_ Nabi. "But I'd still prefer you happy to sad. I don't have to be your friend to like you. I won't be around every time you want to cry or mope or whatever—I don't have the patience to comfort you, or anyone for that matter—but I am here _now_."

If you could put up with a day-long date with Hyoudou just to get something you wanted, you can stand to hear Ruri—someone you're not actually planning to murder—out for a few hours.

"Thank you," she says. "I don't really want to talk about it anymore, though. I need a plan. I need to be _doing something_."

"Use that drive. Come up with one." Internally, you sigh with relief. "I must contact Lord Azazel."

"What about?"

"You said you found her at an abandoned church, with dead Fallen around. He'd know already, but I still have to tell him everything else I've learned."

"Oh. Yeah." She pauses. "Do you know why they were there?"

"Yes, but I'll tell you later."

"Okay," she says. "I'll just… stay here. And think."

You pat her on the head. She doesn't pout. "Good idea."

Standing, you walk to the riverbank—whispering another privacy spell as you move—and pull out your phone. Thankfully, you have it this time, which makes things easier. Your fingers flicker across the keys, and it starts to dial.

You get a different receptionist this time, but Azazel picks up almost immediately after you mention it's about the Japanese arrangement again.

"Raynare?" he asks. "Are you safe?"

"Yes, my lord." You're glad Ruri can't see your face; the first thing he asked about was _you_. Even if he'd do the same for anyone else, does he have no consideration for who he's speaking to? ...you hope not. Then he'd _know_. "I have some more information about what happened, thanks to Ruri. She's Nabi's sister."

"What do you know?"

"Everyone you sent—according to Ruri—was killed, and so was Nabi. I believe the attackers stole the research and the Sacred Gear they'd managed to unbind as well, given how Ruri described it. _Did_ they manage to unbind it?"

"Yes," Azazel says. His voice is even. "They did. Abathar said it was so bright he couldn't look directly at it."

"Then they definitely stole it. They being at least a six-tailed kitsune, and an unknown accomplice. I believe there were several others taking part in the assault, but only those two survived. That's all I have right now, except for the fact they let Ruri go after she saw the kitsune kill Nabi right in front of her, so they don't care who knows. Oh – and he—the kitsune—was wearing the robes of a priest of the Yasaka shrine."

"Oh? How interesting." Azazel is still eerily relaxed. "It seems very unlikely that Yasaka would authorise the murder of six Fallen Angels whose passage and residence I personally arranged, but I will have to ask her if she knows anyone who would. Don't worry – I'll make sure the investigation leaves you alone. I know you don't want to be involved in any Factional matters at the moment."

"Ah, about that, my lord," you say, definitely not a touch nervously, "I actually agreed to help Ruri hunt down Nabi's killers. So I'll be looking into what happened to our brothers and sisters at the same time."

He's silent for a moment. "Then be careful. I'm sure you know what it says about someone when they successfully pull off something like this. And six tails is a lot, as far as kitsune go."

You nod, and then realise he can't see it. "I will be, and I certainly won't be looking for straight fights if I find the culprits."

That, of course, doesn't mean you won't be looking for fights at all. This _will_ be your victory – you're just not going to be stupid about it.

"Good, good." He sounds approving—not just offering platitudes—and your smile warms your face. When he speaks again, he's far more serious. "If you're going to be investigating, could you visit the church and collect the bodies of those we lost? I don't want them left there lying in the dirt. I'm sure there's somewhere more dignified you can move them to inside the church itself until they can be collected."

"Of course, my lord." What else could you possibly say?

"Thank you."

"Is there anything more you'd like me to do?"

"If you find them first, Raynare," he says. There is no menace in his voice. No rage. It still sends a shiver down your spine – and not the good kind. "Tell me."

Oh, God. You don't want to. This is supposed to be _your_ achievement. But you do. It's _Azazel_ who's—for want of a better word—asking.

"That's a big if," you say eventually. Prevaricate. You'll deal with it later – the admission to his face that you might not be good enough is painful, but not as much as making that choice.

"Don't underestimate yourself, Raynare," he replies. "You are greater than you know."

"Thank you, my lord."

"Speaking of thanking, I appreciate you passing on what you learned. It will be useful."

"I could do nothing less," you say. Out of the corner of your eye, you see Ruri approaching. "Excuse me, my lord. I have to go."

"Stay safe," he says, and hangs up.

"Yes, Ruri?" You turn to face her.

"I have a plan."


	42. Hunting 6-2

"I want everything," she says. " _Everyone_. No matter how long it takes, no matter how far we go. Nobody escapes. Nobody gets away with it."

"I approve," you say, "but that's not exactly a plan. Just a statement of intent."

"I'm getting to that. We go to the chu—" she stumbles over the word, "the church and look around. Secure everything. M—make sure my sister's body is fit to be cremated. Then we follow up anything that's urgent, or go to the Yasaka shrine if there isn't anything like that. See if anyone's heard of that kitsune. We should have enough to work off by then."

You smile. "Good. I need to go to the church myself. Lord Azazel asked me to take care of the Fallen who fell as soon as I could."

Ruri nods, a little jerkily. "Okay. Let's go."

"Are you going to be able to focus on your senjutsu?" you ask as the two of you move through Kyoto. You pass a noodle stand, and hold up a hand. "Belay that a moment."

You step over to the stand, order the largest bowl you think you'll easily be able to carry, and are soon swallowing it down with as much dignity as walking allows you. Ruri eyes you, confused, but you don't reply. You'd rather not sacrifice your image by talking around a mouthful of noodles. Once you're finished, you gesture her to continue.

"I haven't eaten since yesterday," you say by way of explanation. "I was out to get dinner when I met you."

"Where were you before that? I couldn't find you _anywhere_."

"Must have been out of range." You shrug. "I doubt you're familiar enough with my soul to feel me from _that_ far away."

"I guess," she says. "What did you mean about senjutsu, before? It—it hurts, but I can manage."

"The last time you tried to use it, your voice went down two octaves, split in half, and then you passed out. Forgive me for doubting."

"...I don't remember that."

"Probably for the best. For your sake, you should think long and hard about whether you're willing to use it on a battlefield – and one where your sister died."

"For my sake?" There's a flinch at the mention of her sister, but the words sound surprised. "I thought you'd encourage me to 'deal with it', or something properly jaded like that."

"I've found that I prefer sanity in my allies," you reply, "no matter how _useful_ they might be otherwise."

"I'll try," she says.

Silence falls.

Soon enough, you're at the church. There is, naturally, a slight problem – you're not the only people there. A tengu and a kitsune—ears out, and three tails lashing behind him—are poking around the grounds, taking photos, scribbling down observations, and generally acting like they're as human as their… actual Kyoto police uniforms and matching hats would imply.

Great.

 _Law enforcement_.

The kitsune sees you—under your ever-present illusion and with your wings hidden—and Ruri, with her tails and ears tucked away, and curses. His more supernatural features disappear, and his partner, who is _very obviously_ a tengu, steps behind a nearby tree.

"H—halt, citizens! This is a crime scene. I'm going to have to ask you to look into my eyes real quick so you forget everything you saw and go away."

Great.

 _Incompetent_ law enforcement.

You meet his gaze, and splinter the questing fingers of his hypnosis with a sharp, brutal thrust of will. You pour enough Light into it that he physically flinches like you've slapped him across the face. Who the fuck does he think he is, trying to hypnotise _you?_

"Tamaki?" the tengu asks from behind the tree. "You okay?"

"Hey, uh, Hiroto, I don't think this one's actually mortal," he says, eyeing you the way other men might a naked blade. How flattering. "She kinda just broke my hypnosis over my nose. My metaphorical nose. Not my real one. It is still as absolutely flawless as always."

By this point, Ruri seems to have noticed that this 'Tamaki' is not only a kitsune, but also standing fairly close to Nabi's body. "Get away from her!"

Tamaki leaps away from a flurry of foxfire, and holds up his arms. "Hey, ease off lady, I'm just doing my job. Don't make me hurt you."

You reach out and grab Ruri's arm before she can throw another fireball "Stop. Do you really think he looks smart enough to have had anything to do with killing Nabi?"

Out of the corner of your eye, the tengu lowers his spear.

"Killing who in the what now?" The kitsune dusts off his uniform. For someone who—so far—looked perennially a second away from laughing, his expression changed to something remarkably serious. He gestures to corpses, the scars and scorch marks in the earth, and then to Nabi. "Do you know something about all this?"

"Know something?" Ruri blurts. "That's _my sister_."

She makes to step past you, but your arm remains firm.

"Look, _officer_ ," you say, "I'm sure you're doing your due diligence—which apparently didn't involve, you know, stopping this whole fucking thing in the first place—but I'm under orders from Lord Azazel himself to make sure those we lost are treated with the dignity and respect this city didn't give them. You are, currently, in my way."

You unfurl your wings with two short, sharp thunder-cracks of Light.

"If you want to talk to anyone, talk to her." You gesture over your shoulder at Ruri. "She saw what happened. I have work to do."

You let go of Ruri's arm—hopefully you've drummed in the message by now—and walk away, toward to the closest Fallen corpse.

"Please don't disturb the crime scene, miss," Tamaki says. "We haven't finished our investigation yet."

"If you want to help me to explain to Lord Azazel why the recovery team he sent has been delayed because they don't have the bodies they came to collect, be my guest."

Tamaki gulps – but replies. "If you're willing to come to Lady Yasaka and explain to her why you're trying to prevent an officer of her law from performing his duty, sure."

You snort. "Have you even met her?"

"...once," he says. "On my commissioning. But that's not the point!"

The tengu—Hiroto—is no longer hiding behind the three; instead, he's moved to stand near Tamaki.

"Look," he says, his voice like the rasp of wood against wood, "we promise that we won't interfere with the bodies. But this happened in Kyoto—on the grounds of a Fallen church or not—and that means it's our responsibility to investigate as thoroughly as we can. I'm sure it doesn't matter if there's a couple of hours delay while we finish our preliminary work here."

"I don't want him finishing _anything_ ," Ruri says, stabbing a finger at Tamaki. He flinches slightly, like he was expecting a fireball. "A kitsune killed Nabi right in front of me and you think I'd trust another to investigate it?"

"What?" Tamaki blinks. "Okay, I think we're going to need to hear your statement, miss, before anything else happens."

"I don't want to give a statement. Not to you or to anyone. All I want is to _hunt down_ everyone involved." She slashes a hand toward Tamaki and Hiroto. "Go away. You're as useless here as you were at protecting my sister."

"Man, you guys are harsh," Tamaki says. "I'm sorry about your sister. Seriously. I wouldn't want anything to happen to mine. But this is our jurisdiction—our _duty_ —and I don't want to waste time on internecine conflict when I could be working to catch the criminals who did this in the first place."


	43. Hunting 6-3

This.

 _This_ is why you need to be stronger. Never mind self-respect or freedom – you doubt this uppity little three-tails would be so willing to _waste your fucking time_ if you had six or eight wings instead of two. Hell, if you had that much power, you could just drop a couple of compulsions on the idiot brigade, make them go away, and then get on with things.

Unfortunately, there's no use ruminating on what might— _might_ —one day be. You have to deal with the shit you've been given, and right now it looks like you're going to have to compromise to get anywhere near what you want. Irritating, but there's nothing you can do about it. Just sigh internally and move on.

"Fine," you say, as polite as poison. "Whatever you want, officer. On your own head be it."

You take a step toward Ruri, a twist of your wrist and a flare of Light granting you a semblance of privacy. You can see Tamaki—and Hiroto—frown, but they don't try to interfere. Unfortunate. You almost wanted them to try. Turning to face her, and making sure they can't see your lips, you speak.

"Ruri, you'll need to tell these idiots what you know." You gesture over your shoulder. "We could smack them out of the way and investigate ourselves, but if there's already official attention on what happened here, I don't want to piss it off unless I have to."

Her expression is, shall we say, _unamused_ , but as she opens her mouth, you continue to talk.

"Yes, I know. It's annoying. I won't ask you to speak to the kitsune; I'm sure the tengu will be willing to take your deposition. But if we want to get anything done here, we're going to have to cooperate to some degree or they'll just stonewall us forever."

You're quite familiar with the whole 'death before dishonour' personality type, and you'd bet at least _one_ of these two have a body pillow called Duty-chan or something similarly ridiculous tucked away in their bedrooms.

(Obviously you never—not for one single moment—considered taking Kalawarner up on her offer to buy you one of Azazel. _Obviously_ ).

Ruri is silent for several moments. "Fine. I'll do it. But don't expect me to like it."

Funnily enough, you didn't.

"Good," you say. "Give the statement, then join me. Try not to be too difficult – the faster we deal with this inanity, the faster I can take care of the bodies, and the faster you can do the same for your sister."

She flinches slightly at the mention of Nabi's death. Not for the first time. Unfortunate. You'll need to train that weakness out of her, or else she's going to be ripped apart by whatever kitsune—or even just well-informed youkai—decides to fuck with her in future. Oh well. Another task for later.

You relax the privacy spell, and turn back to Tamaki. "Ruri'll give her statement, just not to you. To your partner. And I'll graciously let you assist me in _my_ investigation."

"That's… not exactly how these things work," he says.

"It is today." Your voice is light. Affable, even. "Unless you want to find out how else this could go."

"A—are you _threatening me?_ " He looks honestly baffled. "Lady, I'm a police officer. I get that six times a week."

"Perish the thought!" You model your smile off Argento's. "I was only saying that either you cooperate with us just like we're cooperating with you, or I kick this up to Lord Azazel, you do the same for Yasaka, and then we waste the rest of today doing fuck-all because of politics."

"Or you could let us get on with our job."

"And _I_ could say the same to you. Funny how that works."

He sighs. "Sure, whatever. Let's not bother with that rabbit hole. Hiroto, take the girl's statement. I'll supervise the lady."

"I'm glad you see it my way," you say. "Don't forget to pay attention. You might learn something."

"You're awfully confident," he replies.

"I've forgotten more about sorcery than you probably know."

You wonder if he gets the joke.

"I'll take your word for it."

"Good. You're learning."

With that, you walk away from Ruri, toward the interior of the church. You've been in hundreds – you know how they're arranged, and where someone would hide anything of value. No doubt that's where Nabi's files and so on were, and probably the Gear as well; Ruri said or implied that's what the accomplice was carrying, so best to start looking at the _actual_ scene of the crime.

"I agreed to cooperate," Tamaki says, hurrying to match your stride, "but that sort of implies, you know, _cooperation_ , not just mindlessly following along with whatever you've decided to do. Where are we going?"

Heaven forbid he make this easy.

"I've probably lived in churches like this for a century or so, if you count all the days I've spent in them over the years. The ones who did this stole something from us on their way out, and so I'm going to start investigating from where it would have been kept. Thankfully, I know exactly where _that_ is, because, you know, this is Grigori territory, and _I just so happen to be a Fallen Angel_. Any other questions?"

He doesn't reply.

When you reach the vault—you never bothered adding one to the church in Kuoh because, well, you didn't need it—you're spared having to distract Tamaki so you could undo the security spells without him seeing what they are by the fact there _are_ no security spells. Just a wide-open door, a scar of blood in the stone, and two halves of a body in two halves of the room.

"Well," you say, the words of a postcognition chant at the forefront of your thoughts, "let's get started."

In the end, Tamaki proves a surprisingly competent investigator. By the time Ruri and Hiroto approach the two of you as you're straightening up from studying what turned out to be yet another charred human corpse, you've determined quite a few interesting things about what happened here.

First, apart from the Nabi, the kitsune, and the Fallen, every other body is human. Lingering traces of mortal sorcery are everywhere, but none are particularly impressive. Exactly what you'd expect if someone had grabbed a bunch of sorcerous footsoldiers— from a mercenary group, a desperate magician's guild, or wherever—to use as disposable distractions that can't easily be traced. Vaguely contradictory with the whole "wearing a Yasaka shrine outfit" the kitsune had going on, but there are two obvious explanations for that.

Either he's actually trying to frame Yasaka and doing a shitty job of it – or he wants it to seem that way.

You're pretty sure it wasn't really Yasaka, and you suspect most everyone else would think the same way. But Nabi very clearly had enemies in Yasaka's _court_ , and it's the sort of scheming you'd expect from a kitsune to _rely_ on the fact nobody would expect Yasaka to order an attack on the Grigori to hide their own involvement. If it looks like someone's framing Yasaka poorly, that suggests an amateur. More importantly, it makes people think _consciously_ about the fact it couldn't have been Yasaka, which means they're less likely to consider any leads that point in her direction, and thus the direction of her court.

It's the sort of thing you'd do if you were in Yasaka's court and decided you wanted Nabi dead.

Of course, then comes the next question: did you see through it so easily because you're at least as smart as whoever was behind this, or because you were _supposed to_ , and the perpetrators had nothing to do with Yasaka at all?

It's times like this when you remember why you hate politics.

Anyway, another thing to consider later. Like everything else you found out.

The kitsune never used any sorcery, not even foxfire; a sensible precaution, given it could be used to trace him. Unfortunately, that means he was talented enough to overwhelm a five-tails and half a dozen Fallen with pure melee. Regardless of the fact he had help, when you catch up to him, you're going to stay well away from his claws.

The only reason that's more impressive than terrifying is that his accomplice was a Vanara. That implies the kitsune certainly wasn't the _only_ one fighting at close range. Of course, that just gives you more reason to want to fight both of them from as far away as possible. You like your organs on the inside and your chakra—such as it is—not imploding in your veins.

The last piece of information you uncovered is that the two thieves didn't actually start by murdering _everyone_. They snuck in, killed Hamael, who was guarding the vault, and stole the Gear and Nabi's work. A mixture of postcognition—straining so far back that your head feels like you've been making out with a sledgehammer—and studying the more mundane evidence suggested they were confronted on their way out, which is when they called in their reinforcements and everything went to shit. Literally, in the case of one of the human dead.

"What have you found?" Ruri asks. "Are you done yet?"

As you start relaying the findings to her, Hiroto crouches down to investigate the corpse you're standing over.

"Huh," he says. "I recognise these robes."

You're not quite sure how, considering they're mostly ash, but whatever.

"Where from, Hiro?" Tamaki asks.

"I spent a couple of decades serving with the Sons of Honour, before I joined the force. We ran into the White Chrysanthemums plenty of times on various contracts. This is their standard sorcerer's outfit, or what's left of it anyway."

"That," Tamaki says, holding a finger up, "sounds like a _lead_."

You smile in satisfaction. "It does, doesn't it?"

"...you're going to investigate it before us, aren't you? While we're stuck clearing everything up here."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." A puppy would be jealous of your innocence.

Tamaki sighs. "For Lord Inari's sake, Hiro."

"Why are you blaming me? Without me you wouldn't _have_ the lead!"

"Yeah," Tamaki mutters, "and neither would they."

"I don't mean to interrupt the show," you say, "but I can't help noting that we finished investigating the Fallen a while ago. Have we cooperated enough that you'll let me actually do something about the corpses of my kin scattered around the place?"

"Sure," Tamaki says, waving a hand in your direction. "We still need to examine the kitsune—"

"Nabi," Hiroto interjects.

"—examine Nabi, but I suspect your friend might want to be there for that. So go ahead."

About fucking time.

"I'm not letting you _look_ at my sister without my permission," Ruri says. She's not quite snarling, but you can tell she wants to.

Tamaki nods. "I figured."

You reach over, and lay a hand on Ruri's shoulder. She's hot beneath your fingers, like there's nothing under her skin but fire. "I'll be finished soon."

You release her, and move to the nearest Fallen body. Lo and behold, it's Abathar. _Who's the failure now?_ You heft what's left of him up, and carry him into the church.

There's probably some sort of irony in that.


	44. Hunting 6-4

You don't bother to stick around after Ruri and the stooges are done. You've finished collecting the bodies, interring them in the vault—you think Azazel will appreciate treating them like precious treasures—and securing them as best as best you could. The wards aren't great, given you only had about twenty minutes to spend on them, but they're better than they _should_ be. The thieves didn't expunge the vault's defences, just broke through them, and that means you still had remnants of power to work off.

You'd have liked to do more, but it'll be good enough for now – you doubt anyone's going to try and steal them for samples, not before whoever Azazel sends arrives. The thieves didn't when they easily could have, and while you suspect Nabi might've considered it, she's sort of… dead. If there's anyone else out there with the right knowledge, motive, and opportunity to desecrate the corpses for science—or sorcery—then you've got a few questions for the universe.

(Most of them start with 'what' and end with 'the fuck?').

When you meet up with Ruri outside the church, she asks if you could conjure her an urn. Rather than admit the truth directly—that you don't have the power to make anything long-lasting—you pull stone from the path beneath your feet and shape it instead. You might not be able to throw lightning or breathe fire, but something this simple is the sort of trick you used to impress the natives long, long ago.

The fact you make it beautiful, all elegant curves and spiralling filigree—or an imitation of it, at least—is everything to do with your pride and nothing to do with her expression.

You can't give shoddy art to your student.

She takes it without a word—her hand shakes, slightly—and returns a few minutes later. Nabi's body is nowhere to be seen.

"Well, officers," you say as you turn to leave, "it's been a _genuine_ pleasure, but we've got things to do. You know how it is: places to be and people to see."

"And I'm sure those places and people are nothing to do with the White Chrysanthemums," Tamaki says. If his voice was any dryer, you'd expect to hear it again in your laundry.

"Perish the thought."

You toss a mocking wave over your shoulder, Ruri at your side, and stroll away from the church.

Unfortunately, your next step—the metaphorical one, not the literal one—is a little more complicated than you made it sound. You don't _know_ where the White Chrysanthemums are based. You'd never heard of them until Hiroto brought them up. That means if you want to go visiting anywhere, you need to find them – and do it soon, before Tamaki and Hiroto finish working the scene of the crime and can follow up on the discovery.

That calls for a visit to Kyoto's underworld – except you don't know how to find _that_ either.

Thankfully, that's the easy part. You're a Fallen Angel. You literally live in the Underworld—or at least you did for the past two millennia—and most of your missions featured the sort of people who measure their prestige by the length of their rap sheet. No: you might not know where Kyoto's underworld is, but you sure as Hell know where, and how, to start looking.

The main question is whether or not you should take Ruri. On the one hand, navigating the underbelly of a city is a vital learning experience. On the other, she's innocent and off-balance to boot – they'd eat her alive, and it'd cost you reputation and potentially opportunities to protect her. You could just… _not_ , but given what she's been through, you're pretty sure you don't want to be around when she inevitably snaps.

Knowing your luck, she'd try to claw somebody important's eye out, and you'd rather not run from the supernatural equivalent of the yakuza. You already can't go back to Chicago. No need to add _Kyoto_ to the list. If you bring Ruri along, you're going to need to run interference between her and whichever jumped-up thug assumes she's selling something – or is for sale. You have to correct that mistake enough alone.

Thus, the issue at hand: _do_ you bring Ruri with you when you're visiting various dens of iniquity and persons of ill repute, or do you convince her to stay out of it until you've found the White Chrysanthemums?

In the end, it's easy. You can't afford to bring her, so you won't.

Decision made, you're thinking of a way to phrase it to her when she speaks.

"Hey, Sabetha," she says, fingers firmly clasped around the urn, "can you tell me why Nabi was—why she was murdered? You said you knew."

"And I said I'd tell you later." It had been tempting to sit out the rest of the day, explain your connection with Nabi, and deal with the inevitable "you betrayed me!" melodrama, but in the end you prioritised what Ruri originally said she wanted. Though you'd be lying if the decision wasn't selfish, too, because dealing with emotional baggage is for people who give a fuck.

"It _is_ later."

You sigh. "We're also chasing a time-sensitive lead. You're not ready for that conversation, _I'm_ not ready for that conversation, and we have work to do. Once we're finished with the White Chrysanthemums, at least for today, then I'll tell you."

"I don't understand. She was a scientist. What could be so bad about what she was doing that _you're_ not ready to tell me?"

 _It's got nothing to do with what_ she _was doing,_ you do not say.

"You're overthinking things. Try not to worry about it." You pat her head for emphasis.

She pouts – even if it's just for half a second before her face remembers she's supposed to be sad.

O, glorious day!

"More seriously, do you have somewhere to put that urn?" you ask a few minutes later. "I don't think you want to be carrying it everywhere."

"I don't know. I want to take her home, but I don't want to go home. Nabi would want to be," her voice breaks, "be _scattered_ at a shrine to Inari, but I don't want to offer her up to him. I don't—I _can't_ lay her to rest until I've avenged her. She deserves that much. More. But I can't bring her with me either. It's too dangerous."

Suddenly, she stills. You almost skip a step, so abrupt is her motion—or, more accurately, her motionlessness—but turn it into a graceful spin, as if you were intending to face her all along.

"Sabetha," Ruri asks, as solemn as an oath, "could you take care of Nabi's urn until we've found who killed her?"


	45. Hunting 6-5

"I will. Come with me – I'll take you to my apartment, and you can decide where to put it." It'll only be a short excursion, but you think you can trust Ruri enough to let her come along.

"Thank you," Ruri says, and then blinks. "Wait, you're letting me see where you live?"

"You seem surprised."

"I thought we weren't friends."

"Is it so unusual for an apprentice to visit her master's house?"

Your relationship isn't quite that formal, but Ruri is young, beautiful, half-succubus, and an illusionist by birth. You're not so blind as to miss the comparison. Occasionally, you wonder what life might have been like if you'd be born, rather than made. If you'd always been Fallen, but never actually Fell. The children of the Grigori, in your experience, are far more mercurial than their parents, and you can just imagine a flighty, haughty Raynare barely older than Australia deciding to throw herself at the first interesting person she met.

(Likely in some misguided attempt to make Azazel jealous, because you can't imagine a universe where you didn't love him. Still, the point remains).

You're not afraid to admit it: you can see yourself in Ruri. She's not a _lot_ like you, not yet – but you're increasingly tempted to coax that part of her out. Maybe it's narcissism. Maybe it's the idea of perverting Nabi's final wish—given your last real conversation—and _shaping_ her sister rather than breaking her. Maybe you just don't mind having Ruri around.

You don't know, and you don't much care.

She's much better like this than she was when she wanted to _befriend_ you. They say character is who you are under pressure, and you prefer the way she is now. She's angry – and oh, do you know what to do with _anger_.

"So I'm your apprentice now?" Ruri asks. "That's a step up from student, at least."

"Of course it is," you reply. "Students are supposed to learn. Apprentices are supposed to _serve_. Now give me your hand."

She holds both out, the urn held between them. You suppose that will do. A quick twist of Light weaves a privacy spell around you, just enough to deflect eyes and defy interest, and you reach out to clasp her fingers with your own.

"Don't let go."

Your soul reaches out to the teleport circle folded away in one of your pockets, and you flood it with Light, warm and steady as a sunrise. You let it wash over Ruri, embracing her in your radiance. One final pulse, short and sharp, activates the link – there's a brief, disorientating flare against your senses, like somebody's jabbed you with a bolt of lightning, and the street disappears to be replaced by your apartment.

Ruri stumbles, and it's only your firm grip on her hands—and the urn—that keep her steady.

"Welcome," you say, "to my apartment."

She looks around, eyes wide – likely because of the teleport, and not the outstanding luxury of her surroundings. Mostly because there, well, _is_ no outstanding luxury—with one, obvious exception—to be seen. You chose nice, quality furnishings, but arranging for the sort of high-class, enchanted tables and beds and chandeliers takes more time and effort than you can be bothered spending on somewhere you're not planning to spend at least a couple of decades in.

(You could, of course, just move over everything you have in the Underworld, but that would mean returning to the Grigori in person, even if only briefly. There's no way you're going to ask Azazel to send your chest of drawers over, or anything of the sort).

"I, uh, like the posters," Ruri says eventually.

"It's always nice when someone knows how to appreciate art," you reply. "Feel free to take a closer look."

Almost hesitantly, Ruri approaches the one closest to her. There are two men on it, and one piece of clothing between them – if you're feeling charitable. They don't seem to mind. The pair of signatures over their bodies do a remarkable job of drawing the eye to the evidence suggesting why.

"Why is this one signed?"

You smirk. "I'll give you one guess."

Kalawarner was a lucky bitch, sometimes.

"Anyway, while you figure out where you want to put the urn, we need to talk about something." She opens her mouth, but you interrupt. "No, not why Nabi was at the church. That's after the Chrysanthemums. Let me cut to the chase: you're going to stay here for the next few hours while I figure out where they are."

"You are _not_ leaving me out of this!"

"Yes," you say, "I am. I don't have time to babysit you through a visit to every seedy bar, brothel, and crooked trinket stall until I find out where the real big shots are – and I _certainly_ don't have time to babysit you through a visit to _them_. Some other time, I'll teach you how that part of the world works. Right now, having you with me would mean one of two things: I treat you like my property, or other people treat you like theirs. Dragging along a young, innocent girl who quails at the thought of an orgy might as well be pissing blood into a shark tank as far as the yakuza and their friends are concerned."

She glares at you. Kittens would be more menacing.

"That sort of reaction is exactly why you're not ready. I'll be back for you when I know where the White Chrysanthemums are based, but until then, you don't leave this apartment."

"You don't own me," Ruri snaps.

You sigh. "I can just lock you in here, you realise. The only choice you get to make about staying is whether it's on your terms or mine. You want to be my friend? Then trust that I have _good reasons_ for telling you to do something that a blind monkey could see you wouldn't want to. Protecting someone from their inevitable headstrong idiocy is not, generally, how I go about _deliberately_ pissing them off."

For a long moment, she's silent. " _Fine_. Go. See if I care."

She flounces over to the chair—The Chair, perhaps—and, after placing the urn down on the table nearby with the exaggerated care of someone who wants nothing more than to break something else, drops into the seat.

You're pretty sure you recognise the expression on her face.

You spent several hours coaxing it out of her as often as possible, after all.

"Do you care if I leave now?" you ask, as if you're only idly curious.

Three repeats later, she finally responds with an intelligent "What?"

"You told me to see if you care. Do you?"

She looks like she's trying to be angry, but can't remember why. "No, it's fine. I get it. Go find them. I'll just… stay here."

"I knew you'd agree."

The door closes on the sound of your laughter.

Unfortunately, the next few hours are not anywhere near as amusing. You are neither unfamiliar with or ashamed of being found in the company of the low-lives of this Earth – strictly speaking, you're one of them, just a far more supernal sort. This doesn't change the fact that they're generally not aware of that until you've set a few of them straight. Sometimes with words. Sometimes with sorcery. Sometimes with a fist to the nose.

(Ironically, the last usually ends up setting those straight too).

By the time you've found the right introduction to the city within a city that is Kyoto's underground, you're ready to stab someone. Well. Someone _else_. If it wasn't an insult to your pride, you would have swapped the disguise of a beautiful Japanese woman for some six-foot-four monster of a man with more scars than skin. Maybe _that_ would have earned you the respect you had to beat into a couple of bar rooms. You might enjoy shoving uppity 'older brothers' through their own tables—surrounded by a crowd of their self-proclaimed siblings—but even that gets a little tiring after the fifth or sixth time.

Doing this with Dohnaseek by your side was so much easier.

"So," you say some time later, nursing a Dragon's Breath as you sit beside an old amanojaku in a grimy bar, "let's say I had a friend who was looking to hire a little extra help for a few weeks. Nothing special; moving a few things, cleaning out his house, the usual. Where might I suggest he go?"

The trick, of course, is that you're already in the right place. This bar, you eventually discovered, is where mercenary captains and the like congregated to be found by their prospective clients. Most of them belonged to larger bands—you imagine there was quite a jockeying of position to be assigned to this job rather than others—with actual bases elsewhere, but very few soldiers of fortune are stupid enough to publicise where they live to _everyone_.

"Speak plainly, girl," the youkai snorts. "We don't play pretty games here. They're for kitsune, not the likes of us."

If not for the part you're playing, you'd tell him exactly where he could shove his _girl_. But you're supposed to be a slightly overeager servant for a mysterious master with an interest in bolstering his forces for a short while; someone familiar with this world but not all its customs. The less you are yourself, the better.

"Sorry," you say instead, "sorry. My master wants to hire some mercenaries for a few weeks. Where should I go to express his interest?"

You deliberately wait to be prompted—a cough, a nod to the bartender, a meaningful glance—before you pay for another drink on the amanojaku's behalf. He hasn't told you his name. You're quite sure he won't.

"See the hats?" he asks, flicking his eyes to the closest youkai wearing, of all things, a fucking _Stetson_. "Anyone wearing one of those, they can point you to the right people. Might even _be_ the right people."

You lean back to avoid the smoke of his breath, disguising it as getting at better look around the room. You _had_ been wondering about the hats. Not the strangest custom you've seen in the underworld by any means, though – that one place with the noodles will forever scar your memory.

Ah. How convenient. There's another person at the back with a black fedora—almost lost in the darkness of the bar—which is emblazoned with a white chrysanthemum. You know who you're talking to first. Reaching toward your glass, you scull the rest of the Dragon's Breath, fake a few coughs and a grimace as if you're not used to going hard on hard liquor, and slap a couple of notes down on the table-top.

"For your next drink," you say. Better to appear too generous than too stingy. "Thanks for the help."

He toasts you with what's left in his own glass, and you stand. The burn in your throat—literally, they don't call it _Dragon's Breath_ for kicks—is sharp, but there's a satisfaction in feeling like you've successfully swallowed fire that makes up for it entirely. The alcohol does help, though.

You glance around the room again, making sure to look at everyone wearing a hat just long enough that they _visibly_ react to your gaze, and then stop on the man in the fedora. You can't tell what he is from here, but he looks the rough-and-ready type, so it's not hard to pretend you picked him first over the others for more than just business.

When you sit down at his table, it smells of flowers. Talk about sticking to a theme.

"Hey," you say, dropping into a chair with a hint of eagerness, "I'm told you might be able to help me with a problem."

"Maybe I can." Each syllable is a sharp bark of sound. "What's the problem?"

"My master is looking for a group of reliable fighters to help him raid a few of a rival's business interests."

He smiles, drumming his fingernails into the wood of a nearby wall. They carve short furrows each time. There are already dozens of scars at a similar height.

"Now that, my friend," he says, "is just the sort of thing we at the White Chrysanthemum specialise in."

From there, the negotiations proceed apace – you manage to lead him to an agreement to let your 'master' meet _his_ master, which of course requires you to know where their actual base is. The information obtained, you consider sticking around a little while longer to mix some pleasure with your business, but Ruri's alone at your apartment, and this _is_ fairly time-sensitive.

Stepping out of the bar and into a convenient alley, you drop a privacy spell and teleport away. How did you ever live without a convenience like this before, even as limited as it is?

When you reappear, Ruri is asleep in the chair. You honestly don't blame her.

Before you wake her up, though, you ought to come up with a preliminary plan of attack. The White Chrysanthemums apparently have offices at the bottom of one of Kyoto's skyscrapers, disguised as a bureaucratic headquarters of a chain of florists; you presume their less public facilities are situated in the basement and below, as seems only logical. No doubt that's where they'd keep their client records, as well as anybody who'd know about that sort of thing.

The meeting with your non-existent master is scheduled for tomorrow, but you're going to hopefully be in and out well before that.


	46. Hunting 6-6

In the end, there's only one real answer.

You might be able to sneak in on your own, but you've got no idea how Ruri's skills measure up – you don't want to find yourself in the middle of a mercenary base without a partner you can trust. And you did promise that you'd let her come with you; you can't really refuse her now, not if you want to keep Ruri as a student. Not if you want her to trust _you_. So direct infiltration is right out.

Thankfully, you have other options. Playing around with the minds of your enemies is always fun, and you're a lot better at it now than you've ever been before. No mercenary would be stupid enough to go into battle without some sort of mental protection, especially not if they're based in Kyoto, but you won't be going at them while they're in battle – and even if you were, the day some shitty human sorcerer or two-bit youkai can mass-produce a spell to keep you out is the day you hand in your wings.

No doubt there'll be _somebody_ in the White Chrysanthemums—knowing your luck, more than one—whose mind you can't just reach into, pull a few levers, and send to do your bidding. But anyone like that is going to be important, and that means your… assistants will recognise them. As long as you stay out of their way, you'll be fine. Ruri can help with that, too; the two of you can find a place to set up nearby, and she can hide it while you concentrate on your work.

It's a simple plan. Simple isn't the same as easy, though. You haven't tried chain domination—the magical kind, anyway—for a long time, and certainly never on anything more complicated than an animal. No matter. You can do it. You know you can. Your certainty is a physical thing, pulsing with every beat of your sunfire heart. There is _strength_ in your soul, and you can't wait to let it out.

First, though, it's time to wake Ruri and tell her the plan.

Five minutes later, you've stumbled across a small problem. Ruri just keeps sleeping, no matter what you do to her. The comfort of the Chair is too strong. Thankfully, the solution is obvious. And incredibly mean, from a certain point of view. Even better. If she's going to be your apprentice, such as it is, it's practically your _duty_ to be cruel. It builds character.

Smiling, you hook a foot around Ruri's shoulder and shove her sideways off the Chair.

She tumbles maladroitly to the floor in a tangle of limbs, tails, and mildly impressive curses. So she _was_ awake. Naughty girl. That'll teach her to disrespect her master.

" _What was that for?_ " she hisses.

You crouch down and slowly, deliberately, pat her on the head. "A learning experience."

"And what," she says, batting your hand away and glaring, "was I supposed to learn from being _literally kicked out of a chair?_ "

"To listen when I am speaking, obviously." You press a finger against her lips just as they open. "Yes, I also did it because it amused me. But I am serious. _This_ is serious. We're about to infiltrate a mercenary base, and if I ask you to jump, I expect you to be three feet in the air before you even _remember_ to ask me how high. I do this sort of thing for a living, and if you want both of us to stay that way, you need to do exactly as I say at all times."

"Okay, okay," Ruri replies, "I get it. I'll be a good girl."

"Excellent!" You smile widely, the same way a tiger might. "I've got things to do, and then it'll be time to go. I'll explain the plan along the way."

After crafting and infusing a couple more teleportation circles, collecting a few important tools—a set of lockpicks, just in case you can't afford the risk of sorcery, your ritual knife, and several gems to use as foci—and changing your outfit to something more suitable for sneaking around (and fighting, if it comes to that), you're ready. Ruri isn't blushing, but her pupils are a little wider than they were before – probably because you stripped directly in front of her.

You might not have any plans to seduce her again until this is over, but that doesn't mean you can't remind her what she's missing.

The walk to the skyscraper the White Chrysanthemums have apparently based themselves—no pun intended—in is fairly long, and you use the time to go over your intentions with Ruri. She asks a lot of questions, but that's to be expected, so you answer them as best you can – which is, of course, perfectly.

When you arrive on their street, you direct Ruri to split off to a nearby store. It seems to sell electronics, which is convenient, especially given the plethora of televisions broadcasting from shelves on the other side of the window. There isn't _much_ interference between mundane electromagnetism and Light, or sorcery in general for that matter, but it does exist. You'll take what muffling you can get.

Her task is to secure a back room of some description where you can work – yours, on the other hand, is far more dangerous. You need access to _somebody_ from the mercenary group to begin your infiltration by proxy, and that means you have two options. The first is to wait however long it takes for a likely candidate to come to you; the second is to head straight in and go to them. You'd much prefer to do the former, but you can't guarantee that anyone who leaves the building is going to be a member of the White Chrysanthemums, and you don't want to waste concentration and power on micromanaging an ordinary office worker from some other business in the building to get into contact with someone from the group. You'll need as much as you can spare later.

No; you have to take the direct approach. For a given value of direct.

Stepping into a nearby café and slipping into their bathroom, you close your eyes to focus your attention inward. Later, you'll need every searing inch of your strength; for the first step, however, you must not be even an ember. You need to be as plain and ordinary as you were when you approached Hyoudou outside Gremory's own school – as you were when you stole the Red Dragon Emperor right out from under her nose without drawing so much as a flicker of her attention. You crush your Light down, further and further until it is naught but ash; your body feels like you're one too-violent breath from scattering to the skies, weighed down only by the fact someone's replaced your bones with lead and your heart with a stone. It's disgusting. Insulting. _Shameful_.

You endure nonetheless.

Slipping out of the bathroom, past the temptation of coffee from behind the café's counter, you leave that building and enter the skyscraper. The ground level is a general reception, mixed in with a cafeteria, a couple of meeting rooms, and what you suspect are storerooms for cleaning supplies and the like. None of them are affiliated with any one business – you'll need to go to the first floor to find the White Chrysanthemums, though you have no doubt that their real base is underground.

You eschew the elevator for the stairs, and soon you're passing through a pair of sliding glass doors into the offices of Black Rose florists. Such an original naming pattern they have going on. If the receptionist knows what you are, she does a very good job of hiding it. There's not even the slightest twitch of an eyebrow as she asks you how she can help.

Thankfully, that's a question you can easily answer.

Slipping one hand into the pocket of your jacket, you clasp your fingers around a carved shard of kyanite as you look her in the eyes. You speak on autopilot, babbling on about an order of flowers you'd like to place— _for my cousin's wedding, you see, oh, I'm so terribly excited_ —as you slip into her mind. It's a terribly slow process, given how weak you're forcing yourself to be. The crystal helps, but that's not why you're using it; you need to keep control from a _distance_ , and that's where the kyanite comes in. Sympathetic resonance and all that. The theory's not important.

It takes almost fifteen minutes of the most nauseating, fluff-filled story you can bear to tell before you've anchored yourself in the girl's mind; she doesn't know she's working for a bunch of mercenaries, but she does enjoy watching the parade of well-muscled 'delivery boys' passing through the office every day. She's got crushes on about six. You can't exactly blame her. Unmarried at forty in Japan is not the best place to be, and latching on to anyone who smiles at you kindly is on the amusing side of pathetic.

Hmm. She's fairly plain, but the only reason you haven't lost count of how many people you've seduced is because you're literally incapable of forgetting it. It wouldn't be too hard to lure one of the mercenaries who she'll inevitably encounter into the bathroom for a quick fuck if you're the one in control, and if there's one guaranteed way to distract a man, it's a talented pair of hands. Or pair of somethings, at any rate.

In the end, though, you don't do charity. If she wants a chance to enjoy herself, you're not going to waste effort getting it for her. It's not hard to attract that sort of attention, and anyone who thinks love needs to have anything to do with it is deluding themselves. Thus, you spend another five minutes or so securing your hold on her, stretching the cobwebs of your Light through every corner of her thoughts until it's hard to tell where you end and she begins.

No alarms sound and nobody comes rushing at you with a flaming sword, so your infiltration probably worked. Of course it did. No shitty little mercenary band is going to have better security than Rias Gremory and Sona Sitri, and you made them look like idiots, however temporarily. You press one of Kalawarner's cards over to pay for your order—the more legitimate your presence seems, the better—and leave, still fingering the kyanite. Only when you enter the electronics store do you release it; it starts to shudder in your pocket, like something's pounding on it from the inside.

The comparison is rather fitting.

Ruri is standing at the back of the store, holding a single headphone from a display set up to her ear. You don't recognise the song that's thumping out from the other as it dangles in her grip, and you don't particularly care.

"Did you secure the room?" you ask.

She startles, yelping as she whirls and almost strangles herself with the cord. Looks like you never bothered to stop suppressing your soul. Oops. How unfortunate.

"Don't do that!"

You smirk, sly and satisfied. "You should pay more attention to your surroundings, Ruri. Especially on a mission like this."

"You are _infuriating_ ," she says. "You know that, right?"

"So I've been told."

Ruri places the earphones back on the rack, and leads you to a nearby door. Nobody protests your presence, or indeed notices you in the first place, so she's done an adequate job of following your instructions. You'll have to remember to praise her later. Back-handedly, of course. She'll have to _impress_ you if she wants a real compliment.

Soon enough, you're in a storeroom, stacked full of various boxes that, according to the labels, are mostly televisions. As good a place as any. You clear a few out of the way to give you space to sit, and beckon Ruri over.

"I need you to do two things. The first is to make sure there are no distractions, no disturbances, no _nothing_ while I work. Telepathy is hard enough at the best of times, and I'm going to be playing long-distance games in the middle of a mercenary base. I cannot afford to break my concentration once I start, not for anything.

"The second is to secure us a way out. We may need to run at any time—I'm good, but I'm not _perfect_ —and that means we need an extraction route already planned. One that, preferably, doesn't rely on revealing the fact I can teleport. The more our enemies underestimate us, the more dangerous that makes us, and we need all the help we can get."

Ruri's eyes widen. "I've never had to do anything like that before."

"I find most people learn best through experience. Welcome to yours."

With that, you fall into a perfect lotus, and withdraw the rest of your shards of kyanite from the pouch inside your bag. You only have eleven, so that's a maximum of ten more links—not including the receptionist—before you will have neither the security nor the strength to risk stretching yourself further. If you don't find their mission roster by then, you'll have to take another approach.

You sink into your soul, and let your Light wash away your body. You drift on currents and step across spiderwebs. You cross oceans of thought and chasms of memory. Every moment a thousand voices whisper at the edge of hearing. You glance past the horizon, staring into the sky – a vast, infinite void scattered with jewels beyond value or measure. You want them all, each and every one, bowing to your might and trembling at your glory. But you are too small.

For now, you must content yourself with ten. Or less.

The receptionist meets a delivery boy, who's neither in the business of delivery or even a boy at all. They meet a man they call Sergeant Shortstack in the—hah—privacy of their head; he meets a quartermaster in a hastily-warded closet for an extensive, tongue-in-cheek discussion about supply and demand. The quartermaster meets an assistant whose name he doesn't care to remember, and sends him out to fetch the details of their last few missions so he knows what needs to be restocked. The assistant meets a door, a room, a vault, and a guard. He has permission. He can go in.

The shadow of your soul watches as the boy scratches down a list of the White Chrysanthemums' past hirings. Thirty soldiers for a business dispute. Two mages for a tomb-raiding expedition. Twelve soldiers for a raid under the name of Iban a day ago, yet to return, yet to report in, being investigated.

Iban.

Oh, they must think they're _so_ clever.

Your ruminations are broken by Ruri slamming into your physical body and shoving you out of the way of a sword. The psychic backlash makes you _wish_ somebody had started using your head as an anvil, and your light-spear comes out almost watery – it barely dissipates the barrage of lightning-infused bullets enough so that they leave numb bruises instead of scorched holes in your skin.

Shaking away the pain only makes it worse, but the agony is so sharp it's a sort of focus all of its own. Your second light-spear is as crisp and sharp as starlight.

There's a hole in the back wall of the room, and a man stands between you and it. He looks like a rapier, all lean lines and quickness; his armour is as black as your hair and covered in delicate, platinum filigree. It traces out a flower across the breastplate.

You know exactly what sort of flower it is.

He looks you and Ruri up and down, and sighs.

"Of course. It's _always_ women. Why can't a couple of cute boys try to kill me for once?"


	47. Hunting 6-7

"Sorry," you ask, "who are you?"

He blinks.

You unfurl your wings—springing from your back like unsheathing swords—and take a couple of steps forward, until you're between him and Ruri. No sense leaving the weak link exposed. Your headache scatters white flashes across your vision as you move, but that's fine. You've fought through worse.

What? Of course you're going to fight. You have questions that need answering, and by _God_ you are sick of running. The mission is a bust. You've already been discovered, so there's no point concerning yourself about fleeing down some extraction route just ahead of pursuit. Whoever this chump is, he doesn't make you feel uneasy. There's no sickly-sweet churn of fear in your stomach when you look at him. You don't feel the need to genuflect to the truth of his existence.

Maybe it's the headache talking. Maybe it's arrogance. Maybe—for all that you know that it's not your place, that it's not who you are or who you will ever be—you just want to beat the truth of _your_ existence into someone's face. It doesn't really matter. You've made your choice. All that remains is to see it through.

"I," he says, almost puffing up with pride, "am Lord Captain-Commander Nick Eosphoros, First Master of the White Chrysanthemums."

Based on the memories of your thralls—well, former thralls at this point—that would make him the… eighth-highest-ranking member of the mercenary group, behind the other seven Masters and the Grandmaster. Huh. You weren't expecting someone so important.

Well.

For a given value of important, at any rate.

"How do you not know who I am?" he continues. "You were obviously infiltrating our great organisation, laying your vile, corrupting fingers on my brothers and sisters, in order to poison us all! Why else would you have gone after the quartermaster?"

"My God," you say, "you are almost the biggest idiot I have ever met."

It was tempting to reference your age—so that he truly understood the scale of that statement—but there's no point giving away an advantage so easily, no matter how small. The only reason you released your wings was because _fuck_ fighting without them.

"Ah, but I still saw through your plan! So what does that make you?"

You turn to Ruri. "Secure the room. I don't want anyone else to know what happens here."

"I can fight!" she says.

"So could Nabi," you reply. She flinches, but you're not sorry. You _told_ her what you expected of her out in the field. She seems to remember that too, because her instinctive glare flickers out like a candle in the wind. "Go on. Get to work."

When you turn back, Eosphoros is nowhere to be seen. Of course. He's one of _those_.

You throw yourself backward in a spiralling twist, and a sword cracks the floor where you used to stand. You don't bother to land, instead hovering a foot or so above the ground with languid, lazy wingbeats. You're still shaking your head to clear it, because fuck psychic backlash, when a bolt of lightning spears into your forearm.

It's a short, sharp jolt, nothing like what you've seen Baraqiel toss out ten at a time, but _fucking Hell it hurts_. The impact slams you wings-first into a pile of televisions, and for a moment you're not sure if you can move the arm; it feels like there's a troupe of razor-blades tap-dancing under your skin from your shoulder to the tips of your fingers. You shove yourself up with the other, and a wild sweep with a light-spear has his hazy outline darting back out of reach.

You throw a couple to keep him busy, your aim doing its best to put the hazard in haphazard. You just need one fucking moment to get your head on straight, and then you're going to put this idiot halfway through the floor. He _hurt_ you. Glancing down, the wound isn't serious; there's a scorch mark and a couple of weeping burns, but the pain is quickly fading. The rest will heal in time, even if that time is far longer than you'd like.

Three more light-spears have him backing off again – except, no, that's wrong, he's not backing off at all, he's _going after Ruri_.

"Hey, motherfucker," you snarl, teeth clipping each syllable like a guillotine, "you're fighting _me!_ "

Light flares.

He spins, sword coming up to parry an axe whose head is the size of his body – only for it to splinter on impact, shattering into a thousand glittering shards. He blinks, confused, and you use the moment to hurl yourself back into the air, light-spears snapping to life in both hands. You can't quite move your left with as much ease as you'd like—it's still jittery—but no matter.

If Eosphoros wants to disrespect you, wants to _ignore you_ , then you'll give him far worse than a scorched arm for his troubles.

Your head pulses, dull as a drumbeat.

Or maybe that's just the sound of his gun. Your spears blur in your hands, cutting bullets out of the sky one at a time. This time, you're ready, and rather than speckling your skin with bruises, even the crackling arcs of lightning that surround the projectiles dissipate against the searing heat of your Light. He frowns, obviously displeased. Serves him right. Using mortal weapons against something like _you?_ Enchanted or not, that is an insult you will not stand.

"Look, boy," you say, "let me explain a couple of things to you. I don't give a fuck about your brothers and sisters. I don't give a fuck about you. The only reason I'm entertaining this fight is because I have questions I'm quite sure you'll be able to answer – though, given your personality, I'm not surprised you're so paranoid about people wanting to murder you. The thought crossed my mind as soon as you opened your mouth. So if you could just stand still while I shove a spear into every one of your joints, I'd be much obliged."

"Hah! You'll never take me alive!"

"...are you even for real?"

He shakes his head. "Some people have no appreciation for the classics."

Classic? You'll show him _classic_.

You whip your arm forward, hurling another spear, and dive after it toward him – except you're not moving at all, instead charging up another two spears and letting yourself fall. Your feet don't touch the ground, just in case the sound gives you away, and you drift over scattered boxes and broken televisions to get a shot from an entirely different angle.

He deflects the first light-spear, and your illusion lunges into the gap it leaves; except his sword suddenly doubles in length, the blade slicing straight through what would have been your elbow. You're quite glad you learned about that trick the easy way. As your illusion shatters, you fling both spears from somewhere beyond his peripheral vision. It's still hard to concentrate on aiming, but he's a large enough target that not being able to hit a pinhead at a hundred metres—fucking Kalawarner—doesn't mean you _miss_.

One spear is blasted out of the air with a burst of lightning fired from his gauntlet, but the other slams straight into his armour – and _splinters_.

"Huh," he says. "Well, that's convenient."

Then he's rushing you, and you're forced to step around a bolt of lightning and parry another with a spear. You launch yourself into the air, and he leaps after you, sword a glittering arc of steel behind him. You smile. _Idiot_. You slap his oh-so-clever attempt to blindside you with bullets aside with the same sweep of a wing that turns you out of the arc of his blade—did he really think they were just for _show?_ —and wince as your brain rattles against your skull. God, this is annoying.

You send him on his way with a blunted spear to the back of the head (no sense in killing him), but he curls his nose to his stomach, and it shatters on the back of his gorget. _Again_. He lands with a heavy crunch, but it's less bone and more his armoured feet against the far more fragile televisions that take up most of the space in the storeroom. This isn't working. You can fool him six ways to Sunday with your illusions, but your spears just can't break his armour. Only his head is a vulnerability, and he seems intelligent enough to realise that – if not intelligent enough to _wear a fucking helmet_.

Well, there's nothing to it but try. You can outsmart one mortal brat without even grey in his hair. There's no way you can't. Throwing spears isn't going to work on its own; you can't maintain an illusion around them in flight, and your accuracy isn't good enough to take advantage of any openings you create from afar. If you were rested, sure, but not like this. He'll have less time to react when you're closer, anyway.

You swoop towards him—this time for real—with a single spear whirring hypnotic circles around your form. Your other hand slips past the collar of your shirt; normally, you'd try to make it as sultry as possible, but between the first words he spoke and the way his eyes have never rested more than a moment on the more distracting parts of your form, you're quite certain you'd be wasting your time.

When it emerges, you're holding your ritual knife.

Sure, his armour can stand up to your light-spears. Let it try to do the same to star-forged orichalum.

You sway to the side, past a stream of bullets, and cut a bolt of lightning in half with your knife. The blade is barely even scorched. Then you're too close for anything but his sword, and your spear thrust toward his throat slants off the edge of a well-timed parry. Your foot takes him in the chest—still airborne as you are—and he doesn't even stagger. God damnit. His fist lashes out like a hammer, and you split left; his sword loops through your throat and the afterimage shatters like glass as the real you lunges at his armpit with your dagger from the other side.

Eosphoros steps _forward_ , into the strike, and traps your wrist between his chest and his bicep.

"Got you," he says, and you smirk.

Your Light _detonates_ , all fire and fury, so bright it might have blinded you if you hadn't already shut your eyes. Your arm is wrenched out of his grip for you, scraping it bloody to the elbow, but he goes flying to crash into the wall almost three metres away. It dents. He drops, and you've already launched your spear at his head. Another snaps into your hand as you dive at him for the follow-up; only by flaring your wings to almost their full width do you haul yourself to a stop fast enough to avoid running face-first into the wall of lightning that springs from the floor.

The light-spear is not so lucky.

Your head is spinning from your wrenching deceleration, and you barely cross your knife and spear fast enough to block the brutal cut that would have split you from head to toe. The impact resounds through your whole body like you've been used as a drum, and it drives you out of the air—and the air out of you—as you drop to your knees the moment you hit the ground.

You snarl in fury as you shove his sword to the side. Your heart is a sun within your chest.

He dares to make you _kneel?_

You don't need him to answer your questions. You can find someone else. What you need him to do is _die_.

You lunge to your feet, rage and hate bubbling into satisfaction when you note the state of his armour. It's scorched and warped, his face covered in burns, and there's a loud clatter as he tosses away what's left of the pauldron on the side he trapped you. One arm is fully exposed, now. Sparks arc across his skin, and there's nothing playfully amused about the firm line of his lips. Though there is plenty playfully _amusing_ about the fact his hair no longer shames gold with its lustre – because he doesn't have any left.

"First," he hisses, "I thought I would slay you for threatening my men. Then I thought it would simply be for raping their minds. But now? Now you've _touched my hair_."

"Should have worn a helmet, blondie," you say. "Oh, wait, that's not accurate anymore. Sorry, I meant _baldy_."

Juvenile, perhaps – but all that matters is that it worked. He charges you with an incoherent cry, sword crackling with electricity. Just as you expected, a slash that should have missed you by a metre suddenly separates your head from your body when the blade doubles in size. Your corpse fades away, and your wings launch you at his throat like an arrow from beneath the strike. Your spear is an inch from his eye when a gauntleted fist crashes into your ribs like a comet, and you slam into the roof.

Each inhale brings a sharp gasp of pain, and the only reason your wings aren't broken is because they don't have bones to begin with.

 _Fuck_.

You drop to the floor, wings fading to ash, and land maladroitly on your feet. A stumble to the left has yet another lightning bolt ground itself against the opposing wall instead of in your chest, and three bullets trace a line of agony up your thigh. The rest bounce off your knife; the sound reminds you of rain against an iron roof.

You're not an idiot, so you don't even shift your attention from his face when you see Ruri appear behind him, fire flickering between her fingers. The crackle of flame must have given her away, however, because he whirls – you'd compare the sheen of his sword to the moon if it wasn't about to cut your apprentice in half. She leaps over the blade, and you curse her for a fool. Never commit yourself to the air unless you own it, you stupid, _stupid_ girl.

You can't concentrate against the pain to craft an illusion of her; not one that anyone would believe. One fireball sets his exposed arm alight, but the other splashes against his chest, and his boot—his metal-capped boot—smashes into her side. You can feel the impact from here, and she screams. Ruri goes _flying_ , but you can't spare the attention to see if she's okay – she gave you an opening. All you can do is take it.

Two spears sear across the room toward his head, and you follow them at a run, each step like someone's stabbing you in the side. The first sails over his shoulder; the second breaks against the corona of lightning that erupts from his body. Of _course_ he shielded himself. You're beginning to hate the smell of ozone.

You keep sprinting toward him – he swings wildly to clear the space around him, blade a vicious blur, but you drop to your knees and slide straight beneath it and past him entirely. Your legs explode against the ground, your whole body uncoiling into a lunge. He's off-balance, committed to a swing, and you're inside his reach. Your dagger is a streak of sunlight toward his ear, and you smile in triumph.

Then you run head-first into that _fucking lightning shield_.

The only thing that saves you from being split in half by his sword is that the shield seems to work the same way your Light does when you flare it outside your body. Instead of paralysing you where you stand, it hurls you away. Your body feels—your body feels like nothing at all, because everything is numb. You crash into the floor and _skid_ ; your back crunches into what must be the only shelf still standing in the entire room, and it collapses on top of you.

The pain is distant.

Everything is distant.

Why don't you just close your

eyes

and

rest?

 _No.  
_  
The thought doesn't feel like yours. You've given up before. You've cowered in despair. It's easy. The only reason you haven't since you were resurrected is because you haven't had a chance to _stop_. But there is still something within you that rejects the notion like the stars reject the night.

Sensation returns. Your body is a temple to splintering agony, and your heart beats so hard, so hot, that at any moment you expect it to burn its way out of your chest. You force yourself to your feet through determination alone – the only reason you even succeed is because your legs answer to more than merely your muscles. You are a _Fallen Angel_ and this crude matter _will obey_.

There is a sword six inches from your face. Electricity sparks from the blade. It will sever you from neck to waist. All it will leave behind are two charred halves of the same corpse. You will die in ignominy and defeat.

You will fail, unloved and alone.

 _No_.

Your soul _ignites_.

You are not a person. You are a supernova. The air around you is flame. The air in your lungs is flame. Your blood is magma and your bones are molten. You inhale starlight and exhale sunfire. You are bright and furious and _burning_. There is nothing in you that is not glory. Nothing in you that does not know Light.

One pair of wings explode from your shoulders.

Then another.

You _howl_ in triumph.

In the end, it seems almost trivial to catch the sword between your palms. The blade bubbles from the heat of your skin. Eosphoros' eyes are so wide Kalawarner's legs would be proud. A light-spear ripples into reality over your shoulder. One more. Two more.

" _Sit_."

They punch through what's left of his armour—or what isn't, in one case—pinning him to the floor via both biceps and a thigh.

You've already stopped caring he exists. You stretch one arm out in front of you, then the other. Your disguise is broken. It doesn't matter. You are naked and perfectly formed. No wounds. No scars. Like you never fought at all. You study your hands, watching as Light pools within them, brighter than it's ever been. Brighter than it ever should have been. A flicker of thought collapses it into a light-spear; it feels heavy, solid, _dangerous_.

All of that pales to the wings curling around your waist. _Four_ of them, each darker than sin and twice as lovely. You launch yourself into the air, and it's so _easy_ , like you've spent your whole life floundering through water only to finally reach the sky. The balance throws you off, and you weave drunkenly from side to side, but you can't stop laughing, as wild and free as you have never been before this moment. It echoes off the walls like bells.

Your smile threatens to tear apart your cheeks.

"I did it!" You can barely speak around your laughter. Each word is a giggling gasp. "Can you see me now, Father? Can you see what I've done? What I've become? You chained me and caged me and cast me aside and after three thousand years _I am greater than you ever made me to be!_ "

You hang in the air like a pendulum, swaying, each pair of wingbeats unbalancing you one way and then another.

"But you can't. You're gone. You're gone and _I'm still here!_ I outlived you! And now I've _beaten you!_ I wish you were here, Father." You spread your arms wide, as if in supplication. "Then you could witness me. You could witness that _I am better than you!_ "

You fold your wings against your back, and plummet to the floor. Your fall is sudden, uncontrolled, and you crash into the same pile of boxes, broken televisions, and shelves that landed on you what seems like a thousand years ago. It doesn't hurt.

You're still laughing. You're not sure if you'll ever stop. Not inside.

"S—Sabetha?" Ruri stumbles toward you, holding her ribs with a bloody, bruised arm. Questions spill from her mouth like she'll die if she stops talking. "What happened? What were you saying about God? Why do you look different? Why do you have more wings? _How do you have more wings?_ "


	48. Interlude: Nothing Interesting Happens

On the throne of Heaven, an archangel sits. The stars stretch before him, but he does not see them. A hundred choirs sing a thousand songs of praise, but he does not hear them. The winds blow with a warmth halfway between spring and joy, but he does not feel them.

Instead, he thinks. He wonders. He despairs.

 _Who is like God?_

As far as Michael is concerned—no matter what his name is—it's certainly not him. God is great – most days Michael's not sure if he even manages good. He should not be here. He should not lead the Church. He should not drown in the prayers of all the hapless souls he cannot save because _he is not God_.

He tries anyway.

It is not in him to do anything less.

God is dead. But the _idea_ of God will never die while Michael draws breath: a perfect saviour, an infinite well of patience, hope, and love. That is not what God was – but it is He wanted to be, and Michael has always been the most devoted of God's children. He is no Azazel. No _Lucifer_.

(Oh, how the wound still stings).

Gabriel approaches. She is not beauty. Not grace. These things are _her_. There is no point comparing her smile to a sunrise, her hair to starlight, her glory to Heaven's. Even these fail to capture the slightest fraction of her radiance. No poet will sing of her. She is too perfect for songs.

"Michael," she says. "You're brooding."

He laughs. "You say that every day."

"I can't imagine why." She meets his eyes. "You should rest. Even Father did not work forever."

Michael's smile is gentle. The point is a familiar one. It has been repeated over and over again across the centuries. "And yet, He still gave more of Himself than I can ever hope to match. Even all that I am is not enough. I am sorry, sister, but I will only rest when my work is done."

The joke, of course, is that it will _never_ be done.

Gabriel's frown is worn smooth by practice, but she says nothing. Her wings—all twelve—flutter restlessly. Michael reaches out, resting a hand on her shoulder. "What did you come here to tell me?"

Once, Gabriel would not have needed a reason to visit him. But Heaven is dying. It has been since God fell. Every angel has too many responsibilities to waste much time on frivolity, and the Seraphs have none to spare at all.

"The Red Dragon Emperor has been found. He belongs to Hell."

"Oh?" Naturally, Michael already knew. He is the closest thing this world has to God. According to rumour, the boy had fought a Phenex one-on-one and won – for the sake of a single girl. Some say it was Rias Gremory, others the Phenex's own sister, and one particularly outlandish tale claims it was Grayfia Lucifuge. He pities whoever started it when Sirzechs finds out.

"Thirteen Longinus, brother. We have _one_." Gabriel shakes her head. "Hell has two, the Grigori three, and the others are lost to the shadows."

Her voice is resigned. There is nothing new about this situation save for the introduction of the Red Dragon Emperor – and it says everything you need to know about the state of Heaven that Hell getting their hands on the Boosted Gear is treated with weary acceptance rather than a call to arms. Once, perhaps, Michael would have ordered him hunted. Back when Angels fought sin with fire and fury and the will of God.

Those days are long gone, now.

(Michael cannot say he minds not having to demand the death of a child).

"I know," he says, "and you know there is nothing we can do."

Gabriel sighs. "If only Father were here."

On that, Michael can agr— _Light_.

The throne trembles beneath his feet. Something dawns in the corners of his mind. Gabriel stares at him in shock.

 _Impossible_.

"Metatron!"

The Seraph appears in a flash of smoke. "You—you felt it too?"

It is almost all Michael can do to nod. " _Go_."

Metatron vanishes—leaving behind a log—and Michael turns to Gabriel.

When he smiles, it is with _hope_.

"If only."

* * *

Azazel is not amused.

Seven Fallen lost on a mission in Kyoto that _he_ made the decision to send them on. A mission that should have been nice and easy. A mission he decided not to offer a guard for because it was in one of the safest places for the Fallen in the whole of Japan. They were his brothers, his sisters, his—not children, never children, but something close to it. And now they are dead.

Azazel has sent people to their deaths before. Of course he has. He's fought two wars, and he stands at the head of the Grigori. He is no stranger to accident or tragedy.

That does not mean it stops hurting.

Yasaka knew nothing, of course. Officially and unofficially.

She, too, is not amused.

It was tempting to offer to work alongside her. She's intelligent, beautiful, and so delightfully unreceptive. It's been a long time since Azazel has had a challenge. The last—the first and only—he can remember is Gabriel.

Ah, Gabriel. One day.

One day.

In the end, though, he decided against it. Better to approach from separate angles, let their enemies run from one straight into the other. Maybe even Raynare will find them. She's a stubborn girl, too focused on what she doesn't have to appreciate what she _does_ , but God knows Azazel was like that once. She's learning, though, just like he did – if only the impetus for her growth hadn't come at such a price.

In the end, _somebody_ will find the people who thought to murder those Azazel calls his own. He doesn't particularly care who. It's enough to know who they are. He needs nothing more than that and some time alone with them in a locked room. Somebody _ordered_ this, and he'll bet a wing that they're related to the whispers he's been hearing all across the underworld. And the Underworld.

Assassinate a group of Fallen and one of Yasaka's servants in the middle of Kyoto, and who benefits? Nobody. Hell doesn't want to restart the war. _Heaven_ certainly doesn't, and the Church's reach doesn't extend this far. Asia Argento never would have made it to Japan otherwise. The Norse don't care, neither do the Hindu, and Yasaka is a Shinto priestess. Hell, he'd be here all afternoon if he kept listing off the groups and individuals he'd heard of who _wouldn't_ have had anything to do with this.

No; nobody is the correct answer. Whoever planned this is yet to reveal themselves to the world at large, but he suspects that's going to change soon. When or how, he doesn't know, but there are patterns if you know where to look, and Azazel is a scientist. He's _always_ looking.

Something is comi— _Light_.

A particular instrument in his office, one he built the day after the Great War ended, chimes.

Azazel doesn't need to hear it.

He's already laughing.

"Oh, you magnificent _bastard_."

* * *

A woman walks across a field of corpses.

Some are Devils. Some are Fallen. Some there isn't enough left of to tell.

Her steps are casual. Dainty, even. She pauses often to brush dirt off her boots, and her nose wrinkles at the stench of blood and mud covering the ground in equal measure. Her legs are short enough that at one point she has to hop—rather than stride—over a splintered torso. Reaching down, she carefully brushes closed the eyes of a decapitated head. When she looks up, she frowns.

"Where are you going?" Her voice is scolding, like a teacher faced with a recalcitrant pupil, and sounds like it ought to be served with tea.

It should be noted, at this point, that all the corpses are _behind her_.

Two kilometres away, a Devil's wings beat furiously against the air, hurling him forward. Fast enough to make a bullet blush and only accelerating, there is nothing on his face but desperation. And fear. He looks like a man one step from death out of sheer, animal panic.

"Excuse me," she says, tapping him on the shoulder, "I asked you a question."

He does not reply.

It's a little difficult to speak when somebody's replaced your lungs with a sword.

"No, no, don't cry." She brushes a tear from beneath his eye. "Why are you sad? Can't you feel it?"

She wrenches the blade—like a shard of sharpened moonlight—out of his chest. The tip chars through his intestines on the way out. Blood sprays everywhere but across her clothes; thick, black cloth and a feathered tricorn. She catches a drop with a nail before it can stain her hair.

"Plea—mercy!" he gasps. It's mildly amazing that he can speak at all.

"Yes, that's my name." She smiles, delighted. "Aren't you polite!"

Her hand dips lazily until her sword starts sizzling through the meat of his thigh. His flesh smokes the same way as her shadow.

"Not polite enough to answer my question, though. How can you be sad, my child?"

Her head turns until she's staring far into the distance, across plains and mountains and a single sea.

"How can you weep when _God lives?_ "


	49. Escalation 7-1

Ruri's questions hang in the air.

You let them.

Standing is easy. This is nothing new, of course, given what you are. And yet, as you lift yourself from your throne of boxes with nothing but a ripple of muscle—well-hidden beneath sleek, moonsilver skin—it is still worth noting. You have always been light on your feet; it is a description almost entirely literal. But now you stride toward Ruri and can barely tell if you're moving at all.

You do not start to smile.

You have not stopped.

Ruri's eyes are fixed on your wings. It is almost insulting – you stand before her without illusion or clothing, and she's not even the slightest bit interested. Almost, because you'd be doing the same in her position. Your body is designed for lust, but your wings are designed for _awe_.

"We have a lot to talk about, it seems," you say. Your feathers ripple in waves behind your back as you stretch each limb in turn, straining your flexibility until you start to shiver. It is a feat far more impressive than it sounds. "But not here. Come."

Glancing down, Eosphoros is slack and barely breathing. Your spears still burn in his wounds, so you wrench them out one-by-one. He starts, agony stabbing him awake, but a foot to the side of his head fixes that problem. You didn't _need_ the contact to put him to sleep with a flex of Light, not in his physical condition, but it's eminently satisfying. You dig your fingers between his gorget and his neck, distending the metal slightly, and _lift_.

Steel scrapes against stone, and you heave a full-grown man in plate armour off the ground with a single hand. Your arm shakes, slightly. The other, you don't offer straight to Ruri; instead, you focus on your Light, and thrust both out at the same time. Your ritual knife, lost somewhere between hitting the shelf and your apotheosis, flies to your hand. It slaps into your palm like it was made to be nowhere else, and lacking another place to put it, you balance the hilt on your shoulder.

 _Then_ you extend your hand to Ruri. It's time to get out of here before any of Eosphoros' cronies defeat whatever protections she put up and stumble on this place. She takes it, but you read the hesitation in the curve of her frown and the way she rests her fingers on your palm rather than clasping your own.

A flicker of Light through the seal, easy as breathing, and your apartment replaces the storeroom.

Ruri releases you, and steps away. You don't mind. You're a little in shock yourself. This is not a day you've ever dreamed of, not in truth – not a hope you'd dared to truly hold. You hug yourself with your wings, just to prove you can. Eosphoros dangles in your grip; it's tempting to toss him into your suitcase, but you're not sure if Mittelt designed the seals to handle the living, if she even _could_. Best not to risk it.

You have something better in mind, anyway, if the worst comes to the worst. You've always enjoyed a little poetry in your cruelty, after all.

"Ruri, remove his armour." She startles, looking at you askance, but you'll forgive her the temerity this time. You can spare her a little magnanimity today.

(It's not that you're soft. Of course not. The only soft thing about you is your body. You just… don't feel the need to remind her of her place. She can see the proof, rampant from your shoulders).

"Stripping, searching, and strip-searching are all valuable skills," you say. "Come now, student mine. Time to learn something."

She sighs. "Fine."

Then she jabs a finger in your direction. "But you can explain _while_ I'm working. The whole world's been dragging me around like a bull on a chain these last few days and then it turns out that includes you too. I knew I couldn't trust you—you basically said it _yourself_ —but not to the degree that you were even lying about what you _look like!_ "

"To be fair," you reply, more amused than anything else, "it was that, or get murdered. Again."

You lean down, brushing against her shoulder with your own as you point out where the straps for his greaves tie up.

"Besides, when what I really like look is _this_ , I'm not sure why you're complaining."

"It—it's the principle of the thing!" she says. You brush her jaw with a wing—quite on accident, of course—and her breath hitches.

"Ah, principles. I'm sure I used to know what those were."

"God damnit, Sabetha! Don't treat me like I'm a joke!" She's glaring, and it's not playful. "Wait, is Sabetha even your real name?"

You supposed you've teased her enough. It's not like you don't understand where she's coming from – though she'd better not keep this up. Even floating high on the back of a triumph so great it defies the very laws of Creation, there's a limit to how far you're willing to be pushed.

"Ruri," you say, just on the wrong edge of conversational, "I will answer every question you asked of me. Truthfully, even. I don't care enough to lie to you right now, and it's probably best to explain it all before it comes out at the worst possible time. But I don't have to. Try to remember that the next time you demand something of me."

You stand, strolling over to a chair—but not _the_ Chair, you've got plans for that once Ruri is all calmed down—and turning it to face her. You sit with one ankle tossed lazily over your knee. Ruri stares for a moment, before she realises what she's doing, or maybe what _you're_ doing, and then her eyes are firmly fixed on the damaged platebody she's doing her best to unwrap from Eosphoros. You take the opportunity to shrug your knife off your shoulder and into your hand, drumming your fingers on the grip.

"So, first things first, no, Sabetha is not my name. And before you ask, Jehiel isn't either." It's not really a lie when you believe it too. " _However_ , I am not going to _tell_ you my name. I call myself Sabetha and I wear the wrong face because the woman I used to be is dead. Cut down like a _dog_ by a pack of Devils who wouldn't be older than you put together. Just like what happened to my friends. And I don't trust you enough—I haven't _trained_ you enough—not to blurt out who I am somewhere I'd really rather you didn't."

"I knew you were lying when you told me why you came to Kyoto."

You snort. "I wasn't, actually. If I was running, I sure as Hell wouldn't have stayed in fucking Japan. But back to the point. If not for what happened today, I wouldn't have let you see me like this, because it is _dangerous_. Mostly to me, but if they found out you knew me, you might find yourself being asked some very pointed questions."

You poke a foot toward Eosphoros' sword. You can see the impression of your fingers on the blade.

"That being the sort of point I'm talking about."

Would Gremory really do that? Honestly, you don't know. The fact she joined in Hyoudou's effort to hunt you down—like you hadn't done her a fucking _favour_ by giving her a free opportunity, however unintentional, to resurrect the Red Dragon Emperor—was surprising enough at the time. Maybe her possessiveness has lasted through the grave. Maybe it hasn't. But the whole reason you're asking yourself that question in the first place is a lack of caution, and as much as you might _like_ where you are right now, you've got no guarantees it'll play out the same way a second time around.

A thought occurs, and you sigh. "You might as well forget you knew a woman called Sabetha. I'm going to have to change my disguise anyway."

"What? Why?"

Four shadows stretch behind you. "Sabetha is a two-winged Fallen Angel. _I_ am not."

In your disguise, they will compare you to silk. Smooth and expensive. You will have the beauty of a haiku; hair darker than death, eyes like the ash after flame, smile packed with meaning.

Ruri tosses the breastplate to the side, and Eosphoros is—except for a rather tight undersuit—naked on your floor. Good. You drop your knife on the table and stand. So does Ruri.

"And how did _that_ happen? Angels don't get stronger unless God wills it, and you're a _Fallen_ Angel. Plus—plus you basically said God was _dead!_ "

"If you value your life," you say, tilting your head down until you're looking her right in the eyes, "forget I even _implied_ anything of the sort."

You press a finger to her lips before she can speak.

"I'm not threatening you. I don't need to. If you tell anyone, if they believe you and it starts to spread, you will plunge the _entire world_ into a war that nobody wins. I would love to see Heaven burn. I would pull up a chair and provide the popcorn if I had the chance to watch Hell go the way of Sodom and Gomorrah. But not at the expense of—" _Azazel_ "—the Grigori. Of me, of you, of _everything_. I'm not a zealot."

You remove the finger, and let her speak.

"I understand." Ruri must have seen something in your expression, heard the blunt hammer of truth in your voice, because her own rings with it. "I won't say anything."

"Good girl." You step past her, collapsing to your haunches beside Eosphoros. _You made me kneel, boy. You have_ no idea _how tempted I am to make sure you'll spend the rest of your life on yours._ Just a few, brutally careful cuts, and the only way he'd ever learn to stand again would be weeks with a healer and months of rehabilitation – _if_ you dropped him out the front of his base immediately after.

Unfortunately, there's a point at which too much pain—too much torture—will keep a telepath out better than any deliberate psychic defence could hope to match. You don't really know how to dull agony, since you haven't exactly gone into the medical field for obvious reasons – and if you could, what would be the point of stabbing him in the first place?

Your revenge will have to wait, at least for now.

Instead, you grasp his skull with both hands, and let your Light out.

"What are you doing?" Ruri asks. "I want to know how you got more wings. Were they yet _another_ thing you were hiding from me this whole time?"

"Wiping his memory. I'll get to that once I'm sure he doesn't remember anything he shouldn't."

Perhaps she remembers your earlier warning, because she doesn't press you even when the tension in her calves and shoulders suggests she really, _really_ wants to.

You're not gentle. You don't need to be. The best way to make someone stop looking is to convince them they've already found what they want. You're going to carve out a whole day in his mind, so that the last thing he can recall before he wakes up in your room is going to sleep. He'll blame that—and the pain—on whatever you did to get him here. As long as you dispose of the rest of the evidence and make his wounds look more like failed attempts at torture (he's exactly the sort to think himself hero enough not to break) that you wiped his mind of so he'd forget, he'll convince _himself_ of the lie you're trying to sell.

His mind is annoyingly resistant, even for someone you've beaten into unconsciousness, but eventually you slip your claws out of his thoughts. You look forward to the migraine he'll have when he wakes. With a flex of will and a single word, you strip the rest of his body.

(What? Of _course_ you have a spell for that).

You're halfway through incinerating his undersuit with a ball of flame before you realise you couldn't call enough fire to do the same thing yesterday. A wolf would be jealous of your smile.

A few ashes drift to the floor as you collect his armour and toss it in your suitcase, trusting to the sorting seals to take care of the problem. He'll be asleep for a good while yet, and you doubt Ruri's patience will last her through the rest of the frame job.

"Take a seat," you say, moving to your own. She looks at you for a second or two, and then heads straight to the Chair. "No, not that one. That's for later."

There's enough promise in your voice to see it arrested for public indecency.

Ruri's eyes dip to your chest—and lower—before she catches herself.

 _Still got it_.

"So," you say, crossing and re-crossing your legs, "my wings. That's rather a long story. I hope you're comfortable."

"I would be," Ruri says, moving to sit instead on the edge of your bed, "if you'd just _put some clothes on_."

Your laughter is halfway between mischievous and mocking. "Now, Ruri, where would be the fun in that?"


	50. Escalation 7-2

"I'm not supposed to have four wings," you begin. "They're not a secret I didn't trust you with. Not something I hid to protect me from betrayal, or to spring on my enemies. Honestly, Ruri, I'm disappointed. For all the time we've spent together, you clearly haven't been paying attention if you believe I'm the sort of person who'll _give_ someone an excuse to think they can look down on me."

You lean forward, leaning your elbows on your thighs and twining your fingers under your chin. If your posture happens to conveniently frame somewhere for Ruri to rest her gaze, well, you're just making yourself comfortable.

"Though, of course, I don't blame you if you were a little… distracted."

Ruri wrenches her eyes to meet yours, and they narrow. "Yeah, well, you're not going to _distract_ me now. So stop trying."

"Why?" Your smile is as much hungry as it is satisfied. "Is it working?"

And there it is.

A crack of winter—like broken ice and falling snow—wafts under your nose, and you glance down to find yourself fully clothed. The robes feel cool and soft. They remind you of the sheets the first and last time you were with Ruri. How much of that is the illusion itself compared to the sensation of Ruri's chakra is up for debate. You let your Light spill back into your soul, and the latter fades away.

"Not bad," you say, sitting up to study the pattern on the sleeves. She's even included slits in the back for your wings; you'd applaud the attention to detail if it wasn't necessary in the first place. "The feathers are lovely."

You're—fine, you're impressed. If you hadn't been expecting it, you'd probably have been confused about whether they were an illusion, or if she'd just conjured them around you from nowhere. Your familiarity with youjutsu could use some work – you didn't waste that much time over the years studying powers you'd never be able to use, but given where you are and what you're hunting, that seems like a mistake to rectify. Soon.

Ruri jerks her head. You're not sure if she's nodding, or twitching in anger. Ah well.

"Anyway, back to the story. I'm meant to be a two-wing. I'm also meant to be dead. Not figuratively, either. But I woke up, a day after being disintegrated, in an alley – as if all I'd done was go out and get properly drunk rather than properly murdered. I'm a miracle thrice-over at this point."

"I don't believe you," Ruri says. She doesn't seem to entirely believe _herself_.

"Devils make a living—if you'll excuse the pun—off resurrecting people. Why is my own so impossible?"

Almost despite herself, Ruri snorts. "Like you'd ever accept resurrection from a Devil."

Fair point. "I didn't, obviously. Tell me, do you know what Sacred Gears look like?"

She doesn't—she'd have recognised what the kitsune's accomplice was carrying if she did—but that's not the point.

"Doesn't each one look different?"

"On the outside, yes." You straighten, holding up a finger to emphasise the point. "On the inside? They're the same truth, no matter how they end up expressing themselves. Shards of God Himself, scattered amongst the unworthy to grant them power they have never deserved. Imagine if somebody tore fire from the Sun, and shoved it into your soul. _That's_ what a Sacred Gear really looks like. And there's something just like that in _my_ soul. It's not actually a Sacred Gear, of course, but it's close."

"Then what is it?" Ruri asks. Internally, you sigh. This is one of the perils of having a student – they start to learn. Though you are at least a little proud that she's starting to see the spaces between what you imply and what you actually _say_.

"It's not that I don't know what it is," you hedge, "but rather that knowing what it is doesn't happen to be particularly helpful. I'd much rather know _why_ it's there. It's a shard of God, and it's leaking Light into the rest of me. That Light is expanding my quiddity—making me _more_ —and that, basically, is why I have more wings than I should."

"So, basically," she says, "there's some sort of metaphysical rock inside your soul that's bleeding all over you to make you stronger."

Your voice is flatter than Mittelt. "That's barely even _technically_ accurate."

"If there's one thing I've learned today, it's that you're the queen of _barely even technically accurate_."

You blink. Then burst out laughing. "Okay, I'll give you that one."

Ruri tosses her hair imperiously. Silly girl. She'll need to do better than just not look at you to hide the fact she's smiling.

"You still haven't explained what that has to do with you somehow surviving your own death," she says eventually.

"That's the easy part," you reply, as if it didn't take you weeks of study and two full-blown rituals to even arrive at the hypothesis. "When we—when the Fallen—die, there is no afterlife for us. Not really. Your soul would go to Inari's realm, or maybe be reborn somewhere in Russia. I don't know much about the afterlife of half-breeds."

You flick her on the nose to drive away her frown. "Don't look at me like that. You know what you are. _Accept it_ , or you're just giving away another weapon."

Most of the world looks down on the Fallen, too. Thankfully, most of the world are also idiots. It might piss you off, but it's never made you hate yourself. Not like Ruri seems to, sometimes. Not like Nabi did.

Hmm. Nabi. You should probably bring her up at some stage, too.

"Anyway, point is, when Fallen die, that's it. We're exiled from Heaven and barred from Hell. There's nothing to anchor our souls to _some_ form of existence after they shatter. There is, however, something to anchor _mine_. Light calls to Light, and I got a head-start on my reincarnation because of how much the shard is leaking."

You're not totally sure your explanation is the truth, but it's the best you have, given your incomplete understanding of how these things work. The cycle of life and death was never your purview, even back in Heaven.

"I guess that makes sense," Ruri says. She sounds as sure as quicksand.

"There's one more thing I should probably mention," you say. Not hesitantly, just… carefully. "I did promise to explain about Nabi and the Grigori."

"You did," Ruri replies. You suspect she'd actually forgotten until now. "I'm surprised you're volunteering it. Actually, I'm surprised you've volunteered _anything_."

 _So am I_ , you do not say. "I mean, consider what I've talked about: I told death to fuck off, and then did the same to God. I've broken the laws of the universe twice over. I had to let _somebody_ know how special I am. Because I'm _really fucking special_."

"You've got that right," says Azazel from directly behind you.

You don't spin with a startled shriek.

You _don't_.

"My lord!" you say, and then abruptly realise the only things you're wearing are Ruri's illusions. The illusions that just shattered as she leapt completely off your bed—closer to a frightened rabbit than a fox—and summoned fire in both hands.

The illusions that have left you _entirely naked before the man you love_.

The sound that comes out of your mouth is less a noise than it is existential despair. You have imagined this moment for centuries. Millenia. There's lingerie tucked away in your suitcase that's supposed to be in pieces on the floor. The room is meant to be cavernous, the bed covered in scraps of your clothing, and the two of you utterly alone.

You—you haven't even _showered_.

"Excuse me," you say. Your voice is as calm, as balanced, as a man with one foot off the edge of a cliff. "I need to get dressed."

"Who are you?" Ruri asks, fireballs puffing away. She seems amused as you brush past her toward your suitcase. You would care about the death of your dignity if you weren't too busy contemplating your death in general. _Here lies Raynare. She put the mort in mortification._

"I'm Azazel," he says. "I've heard about you – Ruri, right?"

"O—oh," Ruri says, very quietly. "Yes. That's me."

You pluck an outfit so conservative Kalawarner would have burned it on sight from your suitcase, and march into the bathroom. The door closes behind you. A flicker of Light muffles it.

You scream.

The mirror _splinters_.

 _Every single time_. You kill the Red Dragon Emperor, and it doesn't stick. You survive your death, but your friends don't. You reinvent teleportation and pass out in a heap on the floor. You ascend past your every limit and ruin any hope you have of Azazel taking you seriously whatsoever. When can something in your life go right and _stay right?_

You stand there, elbows on the bench and face buried in your hands, for far too long. Eventually, you straighten – an exhausted wave of your hand and a couple of muttered words repairs the mirror, and a soft pulse of Light sweeps your skin of imperfections. You collapse your wings to slip yourself into the dress, then unfurl them again afterward, pushing open the door and dismissing the muffling with the same breath.

"—need to worry. You're not the only one investigating what happened. If we find them before you, I'll be sure to let you two know; I understand how you feel."

Azazel turns to you. "Ah, Ra—"

"My lord," you interrupt. The rudeness is inexcusable, but you surely can't get lower in his esteem than you must be right now, and he's about to tell Ruri your _name_. You don't hope he gets the message. Of course he does. He's _Azazel_. "What brings you here?"

The moment you ask, you wish you could slap yourself in the face. Preferably with your wings. _Why do you fucking think, girl?_

"A warning and an offer," he says. Because that doesn't sound ominous. You try to hide your reaction by looking at his shoulder instead of his face, but all that does is remind you how they press against his trenchcoat, which reminds you that it's open almost halfway down his chest, which reminds you that you can _see_ his chest, which—you fix your eyes on the floor, and pray he thinks it's humility rather than humiliated desire.

"Before I say anything else, though, I would like to make one thing absolutely clear: you _amaze_ me." Your head whips up so fast it could have broken the sound barrier. "Look at you. Four wings. _Four wings_. I never thought I'd see the day any of us shattered our limits, not like this. I never dreamed it was even possible."

He rests both hands on your shoulders. You almost forget how to breathe.

"I'd say I'm proud of you, but that would imply I had anything to do with your achievement. No – I'm _inspired_."

You're blushing and you don't even care.

"T—thank you, my lord."

He straightens, releasing his grip. You follow him for half a step before you catch yourself.

"If I could, I would do nothing but sit here and listen to the story of how you did it. Even the parts you've already told me. But the world does not have my patience. And neither does Heaven."

"Heaven?" you ask.

"You only grew your second pair an hour or so ago, yes?" Azazel asks. You nod. "I felt it. Not through the pendant – through the Light. Like a match struck against the back of my mind. And if I did, so must have the Seraphs."

Oh.

 _Fuck_.

"So you do know," he says. "I thought you might. Yes; there's only one thing in the universe that could grant an Angel—Fallen or otherwise—more wings, and He's been dead for centuries."

Your eyes dart, shocked, to Ruri, but she doesn't react.

"Don't worry, she's listening to a slightly different conversation."

"I, uh, may have accidentally told her anyway." You can't lie to him. Not about that. "I was—excited, when it happened."

Azazel shrugs. "Then I suppose she should be listening to this one instead."

Nothing appears to happen, and he continues speaking.

"As I was saying, the Seraphs would have felt it, and they would have assumed it was something to do with God. Other gods have died and been reborn in the past. Heaven has always held out hope that it would happen to Him, too. They _will_ be looking for you, and I know Michael. He wouldn't trust the task to anyone else but a Seraph – not for something like this. I'm not sure who he'd send, however. Not Gabriel, Uriel, or Raphael, it'd give too much away and he can't afford to spare them, but the others are all fair game."

"Are you saying there's a _Seraph_ hunting us?" Ruri asks. Her face pales. _Way ahead of you on that one_.

"Yes," Azazel says. "That was the warning. You needed to know, regardless of what happens next."

Oh. Of course.

"You're going to ask me to come back."

"Yes."

One word. It feels heavier than the sky.

What do you say?


	51. Escalation 7-3

You can't say no.

You _can't_.

It's not just that it's Azazel asking. Really, it isn't. You know what the Seraph are capable of. You've fought one war beside them and another against them. Sariel could crush you and half the continent you were standing on, if she felt so inclined. Sandalphon wouldn't need to bother. It doesn't matter how much stronger you've become. The distance between you and a Seraph makes the universe look small.

You lived as a slave to Heaven once.

The stars will breathe their last before you ever do again.

It's not like you'll be returning in disgrace, either. You could have lost half the Grigori and handed all their Longinus over to the Devils and you would _still_ stand triumphant before your peers. What you have done is beyond madness. Beyond hope. You, your knowledge, your achievement… you will be _royalty_. You will inspire awe and envy in equal measure, and history will never forget your name.

You'll have almost everything you have ever wanted.

All it will cost you is a little independence.

Such a small thing, in the face of your life. In the face of all the glory that awaits you.

What use have you for something as foolish as pride?

"May I have some time to make my choice, my lord?" you ask, as if you have one.

"Of course," Azazel says easily, like he expected the question all along. "Contact me when you're ready. I'll be waiting."

He tosses you—and Ruri—a quick, jaunty wave, and disappears.

"You're going to go, aren't you?" She sounds resigned.

"I promised you I'd help hunt down your sister's killers," you demur.

"I very much doubt a promise matters to you more than your own life."

 _You'd be surprised_.

You—fine, at the end, you even begged Hyoudou to save you.

God never crossed your mind.

"You're right, of course," you reply. "I'm not going to throw myself in front of a Seraph for you."

They wouldn't kill you, not given what Azazel said.

That's the problem.

"I wouldn't expect you to."

You step over, and tilt her chin up with a finger. "Don't be bitter, Ruri. I'm a Fallen Angel. You're part kitsune. The only place honour has in either of our worlds is as a punchline."

She steps back, and you lower your hand. "Yeah, I get it."

"No, I don't think you do." Her confusion is endearing. "Sure, I'm going back. I never said I was abandoning you."

"What do you mean?"

"The Grigori is an organisation, not a species. There's nothing stopping you from coming with me. You'll even have a chance to stay a part of the investigation – as Lord Azazel said, he's running his own, and if you offer them Eosphoros, you can probably negotiate your way to being a part of it."

That victory is closed to you, now. You're not _quite_ so petty as to deny Ruri a chance at her own. Besides, she's your student. Anything she does reflects on you. That's how it works, right?

"You—you want me to join you?"

"If I must say it so obviously, yes." You shake your head in mock disappointment. "And here I was thinking you were actually learning to read between the lines."

"Forgive me for being surprised you care," Ruri snaps. Again with that word. She needs to slow down a bit. Your poor maiden heart can't take much more of this. Next she'll want to be _friends_ with you or something.

"Be whatever you like," you say. "But before you do, there's one more thing I have to tell you. About your sister."

"Okay," Ruri says. She looks relieved at the distraction. Silly girl. If only she knew.

"So, you know how I was unfamiliar with Nabi? I was lying. I met her that first day at the hotel. While you were still in bed, actually. She came to visit. It was very sweet."

"You had sex with my sister _while I was sleeping in the next room?_ "

Your laughter would be less wild and raucous if you were drunk. It takes well over half a minute before you recover enough to spit out a " _Hell_ no."

Straightening, you take a couple of steps backward and are obviously much too elegant to simply collapse into your seat, still chuckling. "Don't be stupid, Ruri. If I'd done that, I certainly wouldn't tell you about it. Nabi approached me to extract a Sacred Gear for her. Something to do with some project Yasaka was running. I kicked it up to Lord Azazel, and he decided the project was worth cooperating on, but I had other things to do, so I wasn't in on it. The last time I saw her—except for a quick handover of information—was when I helped her abduct a priest who had the Sacred Gear she wanted to study. That's what you saw the Vanara, the kitsune's accomplice, carrying."

"Right," she says. You wonder when she'll put the dots together; that the same person who wanted something out of you was the one to suggest she throw herself in your direction.

"She asked me to look after you, too," you say. "In a manner of speaking. By which I mean she told me to ruin you so you'd figure out how to deal with it. It was one of the last things she ever said to me."

"...I don't understand."

"You're innocent, Ruri. It was true yesterday. It'll be true tomorrow. You rely on— _trust_ —people too easily. I know that. Nabi knew that. But she couldn't bring herself to teach you not to be the only way that truly works: through experience. So she came to me. I'm still not sure whether to be impressed or disgusted – she had the sort of cruelty even I needed to learn, but was too weak-willed to _use it_."

"Well," Ruri says, as slow and careful as suffocation, "at least you're respecting her dying wish."

"Do I look like somebody who gives a fuck about that?" you scoff. "If I was trying to break you, Ruri, you wouldn't suspect a thing. You _know_ how easily I can lie to you. I could have strung you along for as long as I wanted to. Hell, I could have left you to the inugami. I've had opportunities. More than you could begin to imagine. And I've never taken a single one."

"Is that what you call this?" she asks, her hands encompassing the room. They're shaking. " _Not_ taking the opportunity?"

"You wanted the truth." You lean back in your chair the way other women do on thrones, and raise an eyebrow. "Don't come crying to me when you get exactly what you asked for."

"For _fuck's_ sake," she says, the curse spat out like it was going to burn her if she held it any longer, "are you _trying_ to drive me away? Or do you just get off on other people's impotence?"

Ruri takes a step toward you. It's jerky, almost abortive, like her whole body's a blade rattling in a sheath.

"You _know_ I don't have anywhere else to go. Anyone else to turn to. It's you or _nothing!_ It doesn't even _matter_ if I want to go with you or not, so don't pretend like you're doing me a _favour_ by telling me that my—my sister wanted to _fucking ruin me!_ "

She isn't crying – but you're pretty sure that's because her fury has burned the tears right out of her.

You… may have made a mistake.

"I—look, Ruri, I'm sorry." The admission is grudging. "I don't do this whole sharing thing very often. Most of the time I use truths like these as weapons. It's a hard habit to break, and… fine, maybe I get a little defensive—which means I get a little _offensive_ —when I'm off-balance and uncomfortable."

You approach her with all the caution someone else might use for a wild animal. If there's one thing you've never had much cause to study, it's how to comfort. You've seen it in action plenty of times, though. Can't be that hard if a human can do it. Reaching out, you—slowly, carefully—lay your fingers on her forearms.

Ruri twists sharply, trying to rip herself out of your grip, and you—no, you let her go. She just screamed at you about her own lack of agency. Of power. Maybe your first impulse shouldn't be to _rub it in_ , however unintentionally.

"I can't do anything about the past, Ruri. I could have handled this better, but it's too late now. Just like it's too late to drag Nabi in here and let you clock her one for being an asshole."

"I'll clock _you_ one for being an asshole," she mutters, but there's no heat in it; the words fall out of her mouth like ash.

"Don't get ahead of yourself." You reach out again, this time grasping her hands. She lets you. Her skin is as smooth as you remember. "Yes, you have nothing and no-one here. Neither of us can change that. Look at the Grigori as an opportunity, if it can't be a choice. I said before that we're an organisation, not a species. One of our most important members are human. Another is half-Devil."

Sure, that might be because they all have a Longinus to their name, but you're not _really_ lying – you don't lack for other examples, you're just trying to inspire her with the most famous.

"Unless you're a Devil," _and sometimes not even then_ , "we don't care what you are, or where you came from. All that matters is where you can _go_ – and you're lucky. You can get stronger. You can _grow_. You won't be trapped doing the same thing for two thousand years because you could never amount to anything more."

"You make it sound so easy. Just abandon almost everything I've ever known to join a flock of liars, murderers, and thieves, as if it's nothing at all."

"Is it really that bad? You don't even like it here." You tug her toward you, and she follows without resistance. Ruri's eyes meet yours for the first time since you apologised. They're as startlingly bright as ever, somewhere between gold and sunlight. "You have no reason to stay, and every reason to go. Just because something's obvious doesn't mean it's wrong. Anger, hurt, pride, they're not helpful. Let them go. Start thinking about how you can make this work, not why you don't want it to."

One day you'll practice what you preach.

(Probably not).

"You almost sound wise," she says, smiling softly. It trembles, like she's too tired to hold it up.

You squeeze her fingers in warning. "Don't sass your teacher when she's trying to help you, brat. Now – are you done moping? I need to contact Lord Azazel."

You won't insult her by asking if she's decided to come along.

"I'm still not happy with you."

"Good," you reply, releasing her hands to stride over to the door. "I'm used to dealing with people who don't like me."

She huffs a laugh. "I wonder why I'm not surprised."

You zap one of her tails with a spark of lightning for her cheek—because you can _do that now_ —and pulse your Light through the communication seal.

Absolutely nothing happens, as best as you can tell, and then you turn around to find Azazel sitting in one of your chairs.

"My lord," you say, "I have chosen to return. My student wishes to come with me."

Azazel grins, and your heart skips a beat. You were the one to make him happy. _You_. "I'm glad to hear that. Are you ready to go?"

"I should pack, first."

"That won't be necessary," he says. "Unless Ruri has anything she wants to collect, I can bring everything in this apartment with us."

Right.

He's a Seraph, too.

"I don't mind," she says, because what else would she, "and no, I'm fine. Might—might as well make a clean break."

You blink. "Not even your clothes?"

Symbolism is all well and good, but _clothes_ are another matter entirely.

"I'll just borrow yours. It's the least you can do."

You hide your smirk. If she thinks that's supposed to be a _punishment_ , then she clearly doesn't know what it means.

"Sure. Why not?" You look from her to Azazel. "In that case, we can leave whenever you like, my lord."

"Should I prepare a cell for him?" he asks, indicating Eosphoros with a foot. Oh, yeah. He's still there.

"I would be most grateful, my lord," you say. Eosphoros needs to be interrogated before you let Ruri use him as a bargaining chip. There's no point playing with a hand you don't know the value of.

Azazel nods, and this time you _feel_ the flare of Light, like a distant sun. When it fades, you're standing in your room with Ruri, Eosphoros is nowhere to be seen, and all your belongings are stacked neatly around it. He even brought along the Chair.

"I'll be back later to see how you're settling in," Azazel says, "but there are a few things I need to take care of first. Until next time."

He steps into the ether and vanishes.


	52. Escalation 7-4

"Raynare."

A couple of steps take you over to the Chair, and you drop into it. The noise that escapes you should not be repeated in polite company.

"Sorry, what?"

"My name is Raynare," you less say than sigh, half with pleasure and half with something you refuse to acknowledge. "No point to that secret any longer."

"Was there ever a point to _any_ of the secrets?"

"Don't be a brat, Ruri." It would take effort to cuff her with a wing, so you don't bother. "Go sit down or something. You look like you're going to collapse."

"Which chair would you recommend?" she asks. "You only have, what, eight?"

"I know. It's such a consuming obsession. One for every four to five centuries I've been alive. I should slow down my collection a little more."

Your room is less that than it is a museum. One wall is a cacophony of bright, swirling tiles and gilded flowers; you looted both from the Tower of Babel. Another is the rough, sanded stone the Egyptians preferred, and just as old. The third is gothic—dull, dreary, and fresh out of a gargoyle convention—and the fourth is unable to even be seen, given the closets and wardrobes that regiment themselves across it. For lack of a better system, you ordered their contents by age; simple, homespun tunics from the Iron Age on the left all the way to something that's less a piece of clothing than a set of well-placed straps on the far right.

Most of the furniture you own is sculpted from rich, dark wood a few shades lighter than your hair. Your ceiling is actually one, full block of ebony, carved with constellations; each star is a diamond, and they glitter in the light cast by the smokeless torches that ring all but one of the walls. It was horrendously expensive, but whenever you look up, it makes you feel like you're sitting out under the sky.

The chairs that Ruri's talking about are the only real exceptions to the rule: they're too covered in leather, or fur, or both (all black, of course) to tell whether there's any wood underneath. None of them are anywhere near as comfortable as _the_ Chair, but that's only because it rearranged your standards of comparison completely.

"Actually," you say, "don't sit down quite yet. I need a drink."

You imagine lifting a mountain would be easier than gathering the will necessary to raise an arm and point toward a particular cabinet, but eventually you manage it.

"In there. Pick something, I like most of it."

"I'm not your gopher," Ruri says, but she moves toward it all the same.

"You're my student. Close enough."

You return your attention to the roof. It's easier to pretend you're free this way, beneath a fake sky with a fake friend who'll probably fetch the fake alcohol because you just realised she can't read the labels. That's… God damnit. You're the teacher. That's your responsibility to fix. You'd have never agreed to this if you'd realised you'd actually have to _do_ the job, instead of just ranting on about politics or species a couple of times a week.

Ruri holds up a flask and a pair of wine-glasses. "I have no idea what this is, but the colour's pretty."

She's right about that; it's like someone's distilled spring and sunlight and infused it with rubies. Firewine is lovely to look at, and even lovelier to drink. You only have one bottle left of the stuff, but it's not like you'd be saving it for a better celebration than of the day you transcended possibility. Why not?

"Firewine," you tell her. "I swindled a case off a pixie in the sixteen hundreds. It's very sweet."

Most of your alcohol is sweet. There's a joke in there, somewhere.

Ruri pours out two generous serves—good girl—and hands you one. You're so relaxed you almost drop it.

"Sit over there," you say after swallowing half the glass. Your tongue traces your lips, licking away the residue—like sugar, strawberries, and flame—and Ruri takes a second or so to realise you're pointing her to the closest chair with a foot. It's the only one you can see from where you are. "Unless you'd prefer my lap."

There are few things better in this world than a pretty drink and a prettier person both within arm's reach, but you're fairly sure you're at least a week too early before Ruri will consider saying yes. You'd know she was angry with you even if you were drunk and, regretfully, you are not.

God.

You're practically _maudlin_.

This needs to stop.

"In your dreams," she says, a slight sway in her step as she strides over to the chair and sits down. She's trying to _tease_ you. Your apprentice really can't be this cute.

"I don't sleep, Ruri. The closest I've ever come to dreaming was overdosing on acid a few decades ago."

"...that sounds like an interesting story."

You snort. "I have a lot of those. Be good and I might tell you a few."

"By _be good_ , I assume you mean _do what you're told_." Ruri sounds amused, if anything.

"Well, obviously," you reply after a long sip of firewine. "Which brings me on to my next point – I'm going to need to teach you Enochian if you're to get anywhere in this place. Can't do what you're told if you don't _know_ what you've been told, and not everyone has bothered to learn Japanese. Or Russian."

"Wait, really? Isn't that forbidden?"

You don't quite fall out of your chair in paroxysms of laughter, but it's close. "You _do_ realise who and what you're talking to, right?"

Ruri—oh glorious day!—pouts. "After today? I don't think I'll ever forget. But I was serious – isn't it some sort of status symbol or something? A language designed entirely by a god? By _the_ God?"

You nod, slow and easy like the way the alcohol is settling in your blood. "It is – to the Church. To the Angels. But us? I know a couple of people who've never spoken it out loud since they Fell. They're unusual, though; most of us just don't care either way. A few centuries ago, Abiel and his cronies even tried to spread it amongst the mortal world; John Dee certainly wasn't visited by _real_ Angels. The Church discredited it and shut down the attempt before any real dissemination could happen, though."

Another sip, and you're out of firewine. You extend the glass, and thankfully Ruri takes the hint to refill it—she's less than halfway through her own—because fuck getting up.

"Point is, I hope you're good at languages, because you're going to need to learn quickly."

"I'll do my best."

You honour her commitment by draining your drink. Heat blooms in your chest, and when you raise it toward her, your hand trembles. Or maybe that's your vision. It doesn't really matter. You feel too warm—too soft—to care.

Ruri opens her mouth, looks at you, closes it, and empties the rest of the bottle into your glass. You toast her, sopping a little over the edge; it splashes into the thick, sunset-red carpet and disappears. Thank God for self-cleaning enchantments.

The two of you are silent for a time. Ruri nurses her firewine, and you forget you're actually holding yours for a solid ten minutes. You're not quite sure whether to blame the Chair, or how quickly intoxication has crept up on you. Firewine is _strong_ , far more so than any mundane alcohol. Now you've stumbled well past drunk – and Ruri is barely buzzed.

She sets her glass on the table beside her chair just a little too casually not to be deliberate. Oh, _clever_ girl. She planned this, or at least took advantage of the opportunity. Maybe she'll take advantage of you, too.

You cross one leg over the other so that the smooth curve of your calf—and more—peeks out of the hem of your dress.

"So," Ruri says, "were you ever going to tell me about Nabi, if—if she hadn't died?"

"Probably," you muse, distracted by the shimmer of the stars on your roof. "She'd have realised eventually I was trying to corrupt you rather than ruin you, and it would have been a useful weapon to blunt any appeals to sisterly affection."

"You're a terrible person," Ruri says. Her smile is sardonic. You kind of want to kiss it off. She's cute when she's trying to be clever, but _this?_ This is something else entirely. "You do know that, right?"

"Only terrible?" You shake your head; the world keeps going well after you stop. "I'm disappointed. Almost as disappointed as I am by the fact you got me drunk and _that_ was the first question you asked."

You're not really—not at all—but some appearances have to be kept.

"You noticed?" She seems surprised. How insulting.

"I do this for a living, Ruri." You drain a third of your glass with a tilt of the jaw more provocative than most courtesans. It sears your throat on the way down. "You were impressive – for an amateur."

"I'll show _you_ impressive," she shoots back. "One day I'm going to play you so thoroughly you won't realise until a week later."

"I like it when you talk dirty to me."

" _That is not what I w—_ " Her mouth snaps shut, and she sighs. "I hate you."

You don't realise you're laughing until you've spilled most of your firewine on the floor. It seems like a good idea to spill the rest somewhere that'll appreciate it more, so you swallow it in one gulp and drop the glass to the side. It bounces off the carpet and rolls under the Chair.

"Come over here and _prove it_ ," you say.

She stands, stalks straight over to you, and leans down until her lips are close enough for kissing.

"No."

She straightens and returns to her chair. Her smile is so smug it'd probably break certain corners of the internet if they ever got a picture.

That _little bitch_.

You're not sure whether to applaud—she's learning!—or reach out, drag her back by her shirt, and demonstrate that the only person who gets to fuck with anyone around here is _you_. Figuratively and literally.

In the end, after careful contemplation, the Chair wins out. Lifting both your hands would require moving them off the armrests, and you'd need that to do either. Your pride—and Ruri—are safe. For now.

"Getting drunk makes me thirsty," you say, and wonder if she realises the joke. "Fetch me another bottle, apprentice."

"...I honestly don't understand you, Sa—Raynare."

You headpat her with your eyebrows. Or maybe you're just squinting against the light. Doesn't really matter.

"You don't need to understand me to befriend me," you say. There. That sounded reassuring, didn't it? "Just keep being adorable."

She looks speechless.

Wait.

If she's speechless, then she's not getting you another drink. "Hey. I asked you for something. Don't be rude."

Ruri throws her hands up the air, and marches over to the correct cabinet. At least, you think it's the right cabinet. Everything's a little blurry right now. It must have been, though, because she drops a bottle of what, upon cracking open the cap, smells like moonshine—the _real_ kind, not a shitty human mockery—in your lap. Excellent. It fizzles on your tongue, and you shiver. _God_ that's cold. Like an icepick to the back of your throat. An icepick made of ice.

You are _so good_ at similes.

As she returns to her seat, you're pretty sure you hear her mutter something like "I am never drinking again." You must have imagined it, though. Nobody could be that silly.


	53. Escalation 7-5

Eosphoros wakes to your boot in his side.

"Hello," you say in a voice that—much like your face—is not your own; it's soft and sweet, like a cloud in spring or sugar licked from the bowl. "Would you mind answering a few questions for me?"

"I'll never tell you anything!" he says, sudden and quick as a reflex. It is an effect spoiled by the fact he splutters into coughing halfway through the sentence. A shame, really. If only someone had remembered to offer him a glass of water when he woke. Oh well. A flex of will cracks one into being in your hand – you allow him to see it just long enough to take a deep, gulping swallow. Hangovers make you a slightly different sort of thirsty. The drink slips down your throat like you're being kissed by a yuki-onna.

"Your cooperation is not necessary," you say, "just convenient."

You crouch down, dropping to your knees as if you're doing something else entirely. Eosphoros, in preparation for your interrogation, has his sorcery sealed and his body chained; he currently sits strapped to a wooden chair, unable to look anywhere but at the dull, star-iron wall opposite the door. Ruri stands behind him, in his blind-spot, a witness but not a participant. Not yet.

"I'm not sure if you understand your situation, child." Fingers feather across his jaw as you tilt his head to face you. The muscles of his neck strain against the edges of his paralysis, and you're almost impressed by the lack of wincing. The spell is a cage, and you're shoving him directly against the bars. "Do you know where you are?"

He doesn't answer.

"I thought not," you say, as if his silence is through ignorance instead of choice. "Welcome to the Underworld, and the Grigori. There is no escape. There will be no rescue. There is nobody and nothing to save you. Not even death. There is no greater torture than forcing a man to live when all he wants to do is die – and I say this in full knowledge that Tartarus is that way."

You point over his shoulder. It's not even a lie.

"I tell you this not as a threat. Not as a promise, an oath, or a malediction. It is pure, simple truth. We have questions. You have the answers. One way or another, we will get them. You may be as defiant as you wish – we have people who enjoy that. You have no power here. Every decision you make serves us and our pleasure, and they all lead to the same place."

You smile like a child. "I would advise you to give _me_ what I want, however. Compared to my peers, I'm practically kind."

Thank goodness you're not Pinocchio. You'd have taken his eye out with that one.

"If you think that's going to scare me, you have no idea who you're dealing with."

Your laughter is a bright, birdlike chirp. "I don't care if you're afraid. Your fear _doesn't matter_. Half-a-dozen Fallen lie dead on the streets of Kyoto, and your soldiers helped kill them. The only reason you are still alive is that we wish to know whether your organisation knew what they were hired to do. I was _there_ at Sodom. At Gomorrah. Abraham and Lot could not find ten innocent men, and so in God's name we scoured twenty thousand souls with sunfire until there was no longer even _ash_."

You draw closer, until your noses almost touch. Behind your back, your wings flare, their shadows falling over his face like the sword of Damocles. " _Your_ God is right here, child. And she will need far more than ten before she tells Lord Azazel that we should not visit the same fate on the White Chrysanthemums."

You burst to your feet with manic speed, and start circling his chair. Your gait is unstable, sometimes snapping your heels against the stone like breaking bones, sometimes whispering across the floor like each step is a dying breath. In the thin, flickering light of the cell, your skin shifts back and forth from pale to ghostly.

"First question. Who is Nabi?"

All questions reveal an answer in their asking. But nobody said that answer had to be _right_.

Once again, he is silent.

"Don't be a fool, Captain." It's not his full title, and that's the point. "You broke Kyoto's neutrality, not us. One of Yasaka's prized servants is a half-full urn resting on my table, and it is you and yours she blames. Kyoto has one rule, above all else, and it has only been broken once – or however many times it took to conceive Kunou, at any rate."

Ruri's gasp is scandalised, but you snuff it with a pulse of Light before it carries to Eosphoros.

"Maybe you think of yourself as a good man," you say, with all the kindness of euthanasia. "Maybe you think there's some _value_ in breaking before you bend, that those who served beneath you will thank you as the flesh sloughs from their bones because at least you kept your _honour_. And that's fine. I can admire loyalty. But ask yourself who deserves it more: your ideals, or the people who will die for them?"

You could threaten him again, more obviously. You could say that every breath he wastes is another soul spent; that you have no compunctions with inflating how many people in his organisation were aware of the contract. That the easier he makes your—and Ruri's—lives, the fewer it will cost.

But not yet.

(You would, of course, be lying. The only people in the White Chrysanthemums whose lives Azazel would demand in recompense are already dead. But that is the joy of the interrogator – to control the flow of truth _both_ ways).

"I'll let you think on it. Don't worry. I'll be around if you need me."

You trail a hand across his shoulder in deliberate mockery of sympathy, and slip toward the door. A curl of Light silences you, Ruri, and the door – let him wonder if you're still in the room or not. Remind him, once more, that he no longer even has the power to decide—to know—if he's alone.

In the hallway, Ruri glares at you, her mouth moving without sound.

Oh, right.

You might have silenced a little more than her _footsteps_. Whoops. You run a theatrical finger over her lips, and when she snaps at it—a second too slow—her teeth close with an audible click.

"You never gave me a cue to step in!" she huffs. "You said you were going to."

"I am," you reply, "but not yet. He won't care about the suffering of a stranger above the suffering of his friends and subordinates, no matter how lovely her tears."

"I'm not going to cry on demand."

"It's hyperbole," you say, patting her on the head. Her ears—out and proud, just like her tails—are delightfully soft against your fingers. "You should be used to that by now."

Ruri closes her eyes as if deep in thought. Or, more likely, as if she's trying to restrain her irritation. Extensive experimentation has determined that Ruri is cute, but there are times when she's _cuter_ , and one of them is when she's trying to pretend you don't get to her.

"You _are_ a particularly impressive collection of half-truths and hyperbole," she says eventually.

"Thank you." Your bow is so courtly it could have been presided over by a judge.

Ruri giggles despite herself.

Straightening, you lean back against the wall, stretching more out of boredom than anything else. Your shirt plays around your waist, rising across the sheer of your stomach as you arch like a bowstring. Hell, and the territories that abut it, are hot in a way no sorcery or strength can fully alleviate; it's as much psychosomatic as anything else, a lingering curse from the lips of God Himself. You are long used to it now, but it's a convenient excuse to lose several inches on your hemlines.

(It's not as if you _need_ an excuse, but you don't want Ruri to get suspicious. When she returns to your bed, it will be because she can't bear to stay away – you, of course, will be entirely innocent. It's not _your_ fault that calling you just sex on legs is insultingly vanilla).

"Are all Fallen as beautiful as you are?" Ruri asks idly. Inside, you startle; you're _pretty_ sure Sages can't read minds, but that was a disturbingly relevant question.

"Nobody is as beautiful as me," you scoff. Technically not a lie. People like Gabriel—it should explain everything it needs to that if Gabriel asked you to return to Heaven in exchange for a single kiss, _you would consider it_ —and Lilith are _more_ beautiful, and they're not the only ones.

"You know what I mean," Ruri replies. "I only saw a couple of people on the way here, and they were both stupidly pretty. Just like Azazel."

 _Excuse_ you? Azazel is not stupidly pretty. He's ruggedly handsome. And what does she think she's doing, noticing that anyway? You don't need competition from your _student_ on top of everything else.

"Just like Azazel?" you ask, lips curving into a smile best described as dangerously amused. "Poor little Ruri. Is somebody nursing a crush?"

"Yes." You have a half-second of outraged shock before she continues. "But it isn't _me_."

You turn, very slowly, to face her. There is less menace on a battlefield than in the way you move. " _What_ did you just say?"

"You're in love with Azazel." The thrust of her jaw is a drawn sword. "You weren't very subtle about it when he arrived."

There is a dull, wet thud. It takes you a moment to realise it's Ruri's head slamming into the wall as you pin her to the marble by her neck. Her eyes are wide with pain.

You squeeze harder.

"I will say this once, and once only: forget you said that. Forget you _thought_ that. I will not have everything I am and everything I've done ruined by one _stupid little girl_ who knows _nothing_ of what she speaks."

The truth will destroy you. Mockery will bleed over awe, and amusement will replace respect. A doomed, futile affection for a man ten thousand years out of your league is something worthy only of scorn or pity. And if Ruri could see it, Azazel must have.

He _knows_.

You drop her just as she starts to choke, and her legs aren't stable enough to catch her before she hits the ground. Crouching before her, you press a finger to the hollow junction of her throat, and lift up until your eyelashes almost touch.

"Do you understand me?"

"What the _Hell_ , Raynare? It was just an observation!" There's fear beneath the anger. Good.

"Then you will have no trouble observing how serious I am." Your voice is quiet and calm, like ice over some unfathomable lake. "I grant you leniency in many things, Ruri. I even tolerate your ridiculous desire to _befriend_ me, though I think it is quite clear by now you are an idiot for wanting to. But the affairs of my heart are mine alone. You would be better off forgetting that I have one."

You let go of her, and stand. The more you're doing, the less you're thinking. "Come. I've let him stew long enough."

The door opens after a minute or two's worth of disengaging the locks and seals, and you step in. Ruri follows – you suppose she still values avenging Nabi over avenging being shoved into a wall. Eosphoros is locked into the same position, arms pinned to his thighs and fingers flat around his knees. There's a slight twitch of his neck, the limits of what his bindings allow without permission; looks like he heard the two of you.

"So, Captain," you say, "how are you feeling? Tired? Hungry? Cooperative?"

"I will speak," he says, and you smile in satisfaction, "to anyone else but you."

Your smile lingers for a second, like a man who has not yet realised he is already dead. "You will _what_ , exactly?"

"You heard me." The bastard sounds fucking _amused_. "You said you had people who'd enjoy defiance. Bring one of them to me, and I'll give them what they want. Just not you."

Ruri snickers, and you glare at her. This is _not_ how this was supposed to go. She shouldn't be laughing – this whole exercise was to help _her_ in the first place, now that you're back at the Grigori and locked away from the investigation by virtue of a fucking Seraph after your head. Eosphoros isn't a bribe if you need them to get anything out of him in the first place.

"Don't be a fool." Your voice is as pleasant as the taste of cyanide. "They will flense the truth from your mind like a butcher preparing pigs, and if you are _lucky_ they will let it hurt. Swallow your pride and answer my questions, child, before they make you _beg_ for the chance to choke on it."

"No." It is less a word than an oath.

This stupid _._

Stubborn.

Spiteful.

 _Shit_.


	54. Escalation 7-6

He wants to play games with you.

Fine.

Then you'll _play_.

"So," you say, "just to be _perfectly clear_ : I could pull an akaname from the streets of Japan, and you would answer it when you would not answer me?"

"I would."

"It'd be a conversation between intellectual equals, certainly." You turn to Ruri. "Today's your lucky day, student. I leave the interrogation up to you. Don't forget your training."

Her expression quite clearly is asking _what training?_ Silly girl. If she hasn't been paying attention, that's her fault for not understanding the lessons. You've given her plenty of examples of how to lead a conversation – mostly by doing exactly that to her. Certainly she seems to have learned _something_ , if last night meant anything, but perhaps she hasn't realised it yet.

You pat her on the shoulder, and leave the room. The door closes automatically behind you, shutting the cell off from the world once more.

Or, at least, that would be the idea if prisoners weren't under round-the-clock surveillance, be it during interrogations or otherwise. You suspect he'd spite you by remaining silent while you were there, and even if he didn't, you're not sure you could stop yourself from stepping in if Ruri's performance was particularly dismal regardless. Better to watch from afar.

(The fact you're also not sure you could stop yourself from shoving a light-spear through Eosphoros' thigh to remind him _exactly how it feels_ has nothing to do with it, of course).

The control room for this block is relatively close, so you take the time to admire the scenery. It's been a few decades since you were last home.

The hallways are marble and gold, the roof high and arching. Smokeless torches—whiter than snow—glimmer in alcoves marching across the walls, and the floor is cool, steady stone. The home of the Grigori is a vast, looming place, heavy with history and resounding in dignity. It was built long before the Fallen had fully thrown off the lingering shackles of the God they denied and the Heaven they abandoned, and it shows in every soft curve and missing door.

A door that is conspicuously _not_ missing is the one to your destination; mostly because it's actually a wall. You press a hand against it, letting the hot, sticky strands of sorcery wrap around your soul. The embrace is choking, like you're being strangled and drowned all at once, but it fades as quickly as it arrives. Your soul might be different—might be _more_ —but you are still indelibly _Raynare_ , and this place knows you.

You take a step forward, through solid rock, and emerge in a room that could have been plucked out of any B-movie spy thriller. Most of the light comes from a bank of screens stretching entirely across two-thirds of the entire space; the rest from a intricate, pulsing circle surrounded by three particularly dribbly candles. This is the Grigori in miniature: modern convenience supplemented by ancient power.

"Hmm?" the huddled shadow bent across a keyboard asks. "Raynare? You sound different."

An inhalation.

"Smell different, too."

"Elioenai," you say. The clothes are odder than usual, which is saying something, but the voice remains; somewhere between piping flutes and a mosquito's whine. Depends who's asking. "It's been a while."

"Mittelt's first centenary." Elioenai doesn't turn away from typing. "I liked the plums. How is she?"

"Dead." It's too easy to say. "Done in by Devils."

"A shame," Elioenai says, with the same sort of sadness one might feel when a restaurant stops serving a favoured food. "How long ago?"

You step toward the closest screen, tapping through a couple of commands to display Eosphoros' cell specifically and provide sound. "Month-and-a-half, give or take."

It'd be nice to say you knew exactly when it happened. That you could name the last expression on Mittelt's face, the last breath Dohnaseek took, the last second Kalawarner existed on this Earth. But you can't. Gremory and Himejima murdered them at _some_ point before doing the same to you—you have no idea how long it took, how well they fought, how far away they died—and you'd only been counting the time up to the witching hour to extract Argento's Gear. It didn't matter after that.

In fact, you can't even specify the _day_ , because you will never know if they died before or after midnight.

You slam the last key a little harder than you meant to.

"Hmm." Elioenai steps closer with a rustle of cloaks, head cocked to listen to Ruri's voice. Irritating. "I thought Ammiel sounded sad, the last time we met."

Oh.

You'd—not _forgotten_. Just had other things to worry about. But Mittelt had _parents_. Mostly a mother, because her father had only ever been around to provide the child—Ammiel had wanted a daughter, not a husband or even a faithful lover—but parents all the same. Azazel must have told them her fate, if not how it came to be.

Ammiel, at least, probably deserves the whole truth. It was your fault Mittelt died, after all. There's no running away from that, and it's better that Ammiel learns from you, rather than from someone else _without_ your best interests in mind when everything inevitably outs. When you have time, you'll find her.

"She always did care too much," you say instead. "Our entire lives are a lesson that family means nothing."

"That they are." Elioenai sounds approving, which in itself is a minor miracle. "I forget you're older than I am, sometimes."

The compliment is as backhanded as the slap you're tempted to land. Elioenai might be blind, but anyone who's met you before would notice the difference if you flared the fullness of your newfound strength. You're no longer equals, and you've got half a mind to prove it. But you don't. When Azazel announces you to the Grigori proper—with four wings flared and glory coiling around you like smoke— _you_ won't be the one who regrets their actions today.

On-screen, Ruri has started to speak.

"I hate you," she begins. Three words in, and she's already made her first mistake. An interrogator doesn't _care_. "If it was up to me, I'd have let my teacher flay your mind apart until you bled screams."

At least she's picked up on the fact you deliberately didn't use her name or ever offer your own. Her threatening face is quite adorable, too. She circles around until she's facing Eosphoros, and stares him down in a way that might be intimidating to someone who hasn't seen her naked.

"Now answer the question. _What do you know about Nabi?_ "

"Nothing," he replies. He actually sounds honest. "I've never heard that name in my life."

"You haven't trained her very well," Elioenai interjects. "You never start an interrogation with questions you aren't sure of the answers to."

"I haven't trained her for interrogation at all. She needs to learn to fail so she can understand what it means to succeed."

Elioenai hums, turning away. You still can't see inside the hood. "As you say."

On-screen, Ruri speaks again.

"Your people helped someone _kill her_ , and you expect me to believe that?" A snap of her wrist sets it alight, the flame wickedly bright. "My sister is _dead_ in part because of the White Chrysanthemums, and I will have the one who ordered it if I have to burn my way through _Kyoto itself!_ "

Something flickers across Eosphoros' face, but you don't think Ruri notices. It looks like sympathy.

"We're mercenaries," he says, "and we go where we're paid to. Most of the time all we know is the general outline—security, muscle, acquisition, whatever—and then the briefings happen on-site. Our clients take their privacy seriously, and we have a reputation for discretion. I'm sorry about your sister, but if you expect me to know details of an operation I didn't command, you'd be mistaken."

"I don't want your _excuses_ ," she snarls, foxfire tickling the edge of his jaw like a particularly eager lover. "I want _answers_."

Unfortunately, you don't think she's going to get any. He doesn't seem to be lying about knowing nothing. You weren't expecting him to be a _moron_ , but most of your experiences with organised groups comes from the Grigori, or from assignments where your job was to sow discord and tear that same organisation apart. Compartmentalisation of information is a better weapon than defense to a good infiltrator – it means there are secrets not everyone's supposed to hear, and spreading them is one of the surest ways to cause chaos.

That wasn't what you were trying to do with the White Chrysanthemums, however, and your _own_ infiltration was more of a telepathic smash-and-grab. It's by no means inconceivable that the first person to run into you did not, in fact, conveniently know everything you wanted to.

That doesn't mean Eosphoros is useless, though. _Somebody_ in the White Chrysanthemums will have the answers Ruri and Azazel seek, and you hold one of their commanders in your hands. Ruri will just have to trade on the promise of future gratification rather than immediate worth.

First, though, you might want to mention that before she kills him. That fireball is awfully close to replacing his Adam's apple.

A couple of keystrokes minimise the feed and mute the sound, and you straighten from where you leaned forward to get a better view. Time to save your apprentice from screwing herself over. You're the only one who's allowed to do that.

You tap the seal to get out, and step back through the wall in silence. Elioenai doesn't deserve a goodbye.

Two lefts and a right later, you're in front of Eosphoros' cell. Rushing through the locks takes about a minute, but soon enough you're inside. Thankfully, you can dismiss the spells you had hovering on your tongue – he's still alive, and Ruri hasn't seared off his jaw. Guess you'll be saving them for the bedroom. Assuming you ever make it back there.

The bruises blooming on his face suggest she hasn't been _entirely_ restrained while you couldn't see her, but you can't fault her for that. You were tempted from the moment he opened his mouth… back when you first met. He reminds you far too much of the _other_ bunch of self-righteous assholes you'd like to indulge in some particular unhealthy violence against. You think the collective noun for them is something like a choir? Or maybe a church.

(You probably shouldn't quit your day job).

"He's not lying," you say, interrupting Ruri as she demands another set of answers Eosphoros doesn't have. "He knows fuck-all about what you're asking, and the universe isn't going to bend over backward to change that just because you don't like it. I wish things were that easy."

To some people, they are.

Then again, you've never really classified the Great Red as a _person_.

A poke to the back of Eosphoros' neck activate the rest of the sorceries binding him to the chair. His head does not slump forward as he drops into unconsciousness; they're too tight to permit it.

"What's the _point_ of him, them?" Ruri asks. She hasn't dismissed the foxfire. You think she might have forgotten it exists.

"Information. Not the information you want, but information that the investigators can use. Not everyone in the White Chrysanthemums will be as blind to what they get hired to do—and who does that hiring—as this idiot, and if we want a way in, he's still one of the Masters of their order. They'll dig plenty out of him before he needs to be disposed of, and you'll have been the one to gift it to them."

"I don't want to wait that long," she says. She sounds exhausted, the flame in her hand gutting out. "I want to _do_ something."

"I'll pick out the flowers, then. Who do you want invited?"

Ruri blinks. "What?"

"To your funeral, obviously." You beckon over your shoulder for her to follow as you head toward the door. "A man who strikes without thought of his action can cut a god, as the saying goes, but he never stops to wonder if it's a _good idea_. Trust me. Patience isn't as overrated as I once thought."

It's the closest you're willing to come to joking about your own death in a room under constant surveillance.

"I'll take you to where the investigators are later today," you continue, "but for now there's something else we need to do."

You don't actually _know_ where the investigation is basing itself, but there are only a couple of places it could be, and Ruri's a stranger in a strange land. She won't notice if you take her past one to get to the other; for all she knows, you'll have led her the way you're supposed to go.

But that's beside the point.


	55. Escalation 7-7

"So," you say, lounging across your bed with your wings draped over the covers, "it's time for some lessons on etiquette."

Ruri glances at your pose, better suited to the covers of certain magazines than the—public—halls of nobility. "I hope you're not planning on teaching by example."

She still sounds bitter. You suppose you can't blame her; all that work for no gain. Or, well, no _immediate_ gain. The situation isn't unsalvageable, but it _is_ frustrating.

"I'm not talking about Kyoto's style of etiquette. Life around here has nothing to do with ballrooms and bowing and being related to one of Yasaka's cousins twice-removed. The beauty of your tea ceremony or the precise arrangement of your fan won't win you any points with me, or the motley menagerie I call my brothers and sisters. Anything Nabi did manage to teach you, anything you picked up, throw that all out the window because it might even get you killed."

It probably wouldn't, because Ruri is nowhere near important enough to offer genuine insult to someone capable of slaughtering her out of hand, but she doesn't need to know that.

"What do you mean?" Ruri asks.

You eye her lazily over the table she's resting her feet on. Such a rude girl. Doesn't she know that chair has its own extendable footrest? And speaking of rudeness…

"You didn't even recognise Lord Azazel before he introduced himself," you say, "and you basically _demanded_ that he tell you who he was. I have seen idiots killed for less – not by Lord Azazel, but by others who did not take kindly to similar insults. We are Fallen Angels, Ruri. We are not _nice_ , and our society is not wrapped and trapped in the courtesies and niceties that turn every conversation into an exercise in kissing the other person's ass."

You sit up, shifting your legs beneath you until you sit with a courtesan's seiza, and fix her with your gaze.

"So," you continue, holding up a single finger, "I am going to lecture, and you are going to listen. If you have any questions, don't ask them, because I am not fond of repeating myself, and even less so of being interrupted."

Ruri nods, if not eagerly. There's no doubt where she'd rather be, but tough luck. Some things are too important to procrastinate.

"First things first." With a flick of your wrist, a thousand sparkling motes of Light snap into being. They spiral and blend into the shapes of ten people, like someone took a whisk to the night sky and started to stir. "Lord Azazel, Lord Kokabiel, Lord Shemhazai, Lord Baraqiel, Lord Sahariel, Lord Tamiel, Lord Armaros, Lady Penemue, Vali Lucifer, and Tobio Ikuse."

You point to every figure in turn, letting their faces and forms linger in Ruri's mind for a couple of seconds each time.

"We are the bastards of Heaven. The rebels, the dreamers, the sinners. We _exist_ because we disobey. We have exactly two laws: don't kill your fellow Fallen, and don't act against the Grigori's interests. Anything else is fair game. But anarchy is the opposite of society, and we would have barely lasted a decade, let alone several millennia, if that was true in practice instead of theory. So, instead of rules, we have _understandings_.

"The first one is that our command structure is not actually a suggestion. We are, technically, free to tell Lord Azazel to fuck off if he asks something of us. But we don't, and we never will. Which brings me to this list."

You gesture again at the parade of projections in front of you.

"If someone here asks you to do something, do it. Don't ask why. Don't hesitate. Your behaviour reflects on us both, and I don't want someone like Lord Baraqiel—or some _thing_ like the Slash Dog—to look at me and be reminded of your mistakes. Or my own. So just nod, say 'Yes, my lord', and scurry off."

A snap of your fingers enlarges Vali and Tobio.

"These two aren't officially on par with the others," _and they never will be_ , "but Vali is from the line of the Morningstar himself, and he wields Divine Dividing. Tobio—the Slash Dog, master of Canis Lykaon—is human, but in the same way the Great Red is a dragon; the truth doesn't capture the _scale_. It never does with those who bear a Longinus. You'll probably never meet them in your life, but it should be obvious enough that you don't want to piss off a godkiller."

Oh, the irony.

"Keeping on their good side is easy: just stay out of their way. I've only ever seen Tobio in passing, and I worked as an auxiliary to one of Vali's missions for a few weeks. I don't expect he even remembers I exist."

But he will. They _all_ will.

"It's not quite as simple for the others, however. Lord Azazel is the most easy-going; I doubt there's anything you could say or do to offend him that he hasn't heard or seen a dozen times before. Lord Baraqiel has an… unusual opinion about the worth and value of family, so don't be caught insulting the concept. Lord Shemhazai is married to a Devil, and has very liberal opinions on their worth. Lord Kokabiel will see you as an object instead of a person – don't try to convince him you're not, and he won't dislike you more than he dislikes anyone who isn't Fallen."

Ruri inhales, like she's on the verge of saying _something_ , but it comes out as a short, sharp sigh instead. Good girl.

"I doubt you'll ever meet Lord Sahariel unless you get very deep into our research divisions, and if you're a scientist, or a subject, then he'll like you by default. Lord Armaros is—well, Lord Armaros is very enthusiastic. Just go along with it and you'll be fine. Lord Tamiel appreciates intelligent conversation about the stars and the constellations. Lady Penemue enjoys reading, writing, and cannot abide stupidity. Keep all that in mind, and you'll be far better off than most of the newcomers in this place.

"We have all sorts of hangers-on around here, hoping to ingratiate themselves with our Faction, hoping that we'll grant them a Sacred Gear or teach them how to use theirs, hoping for someone to hold their leashes because the Church bred obedience into their bones and forgot to include anything resembling a conscience. Few of them ever truly learn how to navigate these halls."

Some Exorcists come out wrong. For every Dulio Gesualdo, every Griselda Quarta, there's a Freed Sellzen. Most of them make their way to the Grigori, needing to serve _something_ that can at least pretend at holiness, no matter how much they might rage against the Church's doctrines and demands. Only the worst of the worst—so broken they forget they were even supposed to be tools and so powerful they can spurn anyone who tries to remind them—manage to go it alone: monsters like Father Clef, Thomas Bosco, or Sister Mercy.

The Grigori are the gathering ground for those who defy Heaven and deny Hell. Exorcists, priests, rogue magicians, those with Sacred Gears, and the rest of the Lord's lost little lambs. If the organisation had a mission statement, it would read _do as thou wilt_. But some principles only hold until you're returned the heads of the contingent sent to approach one of those lambs, a commandment carved into each eye-socket.

When you speak, it's as much to break the direction of your thoughts as it is the silence itself.

"Apart from that, there's really only one other thing to keep in mind: might makes right. Not right as in good. Right as in the divine right of kings. If an eight-wing marched into this room and stole all my alcohol, I'd be _fucking pissed_ – but there's nothing I could do about it either.

"Complain to my superiors? Stealing is a sin. That's sort of the point of our existence. Lord Kokabiel might punish them for ill-discipline, Lord Azazel and Lord Baraqiel might be disappointed about the way they treated their fellow Fallen, but at the end of the day I'd have a reputation as a whiny little girl who can't handle her own problems and forgot she left Heaven to get _away_ from the rules.

"Sure, I'd remember what happened, and I'd return the favour if I ever got a chance, but there are no puffed-up peacocks in fancy uniforms strolling around here and fellating each other to the thought of the _law_. Civilisation is all well and good, but there are some cages we've long outgrown."

"So I should just—" Ruri looks almost disgusted, "—just let anyone do whatever they want with me, as long as they're _stronger?_ "

What did you tell her about ques—oh. No. That's one disobedience whose spirit you'll forgive.

"Not that. _Never_ that. If you're not interested, tell them no. Tell them you're my lover and I don't care for sharing. Tell them whatever you have to and do whatever you have to. I won't ever pretend that you don't deserve a choice, Ruri. Not about that."

You'd like to say there will never be a repeat of the inugami incident. Or worse. But you also worked alongside Freed Sellzen, and not everyone has your particular principles, faded and rotting as they may be. Your name should, theoretically, shield her once your accomplishments become known, but even you—who seduced what you thought was a child to his death and murdered a teenage girl for power—think there are those in the Grigori who take things too far.

Brushing her shoulder with a ink-black wing, you continue. "I'm explaining all the less… savoury parts, I suppose, of life among the Grigori so you won't fuck yourself over on the way to everything else. You can find everything you want—everything you _need_ —with us, as long as you're useful. And that's the easy part. I don't know if we actually have another Sage on our roster – but whether we do or not, there'll be plenty of people interested in seeing what you're capable of. The investigation department will adore you. So will our scientists. And Nabi's murderers won't get away.

"I have lived here for thousands of years, and the first time I considered not coming back was in the weeks after I _died_. This has been my home for a very, very long time, regardless of what it thinks of me or I think of it. Don't be discouraged by anything I've said: you'll like it here far more than you ever did Kyoto."

You stand, stepping off your bed and sinking your feet into the deliciously soft fur that covers most of the floor. Back in Heaven, you walked along the clouds; set against the right sunset, there'd be no difference between them and your carpet.

"Now, come along. It's time I introduce you to the people you'll be selling Eosphoros to."

After that, well… that's the question, isn't it? You've got a lot on your plate, and given the shape of your second life to date, probably not enough time to do it in.

Guess it's time to prioritise.


	56. Escalation 7-8

**This marks the last of what is pre-written. We'll return to my usual update schedule—that is, more inconsistent than my plotting—from now on. Spare a kind thought for my quest thread, who've had to deal with that since October of last year, when this whole thing began.**

* * *

No more hiding.

Your last concession to secrecy was interrogating Eosphoros, and that was entirely so nobody would interrupt you along the way. That no longer matters—he no longer matters—and so you will walk these halls as who and what you are. Illusions collapse like shattering glass as you shed the elegant shadow of a woman unmistakably noble and Japanese both. It had been a beautiful lie, but not quite as beautiful as you.

Your clothes—a thin shirt and shorts that in some places wouldn't have even qualified as underwear—no longer fit you; they're the sort of tight not so much left to the imagination as usually found inside it. You were, after all, pretending to be someone from a culture whose idea of a stereotypical foreigner still wouldn't be as voluptuous as you. While it's tempting to leave things as-is, there's only one set of assets you plan on emphasising today.

A couple of syllables slip off your tongue, and soon enough you don't feel like you're about to explode into cotton fibre and naked flesh with every step. Flexing your wings just for the joy of it, you turn to Ruri.

"If there's anything you want to say to them, I'd start planning it as we walk. I'll help you negotiate if it proves necessary, but I'd much rather it didn't. The sooner you look like you can stand on your own two feet, the better off you'll be if you want to actually be trusted in the field before we've already caught the ones behind Nabi's death."

Ruri's silent for a few seconds. "What about translating?"

You tilt your head to the side. "Hmm?"

"You said not everyone would know Russian. Or Japanese. What if I need you to speak _for_ me?"

Your laughter is short, but no less amused for it. "We're investigating something that happened _in_ Japan, Ruri. Of course they can all speak Japanese. You needn't worry about that."

"I guess," Ruri says. You can almost smell the embarrassment.

You're at the doorway before you turn around to face her. "Well? Are you coming?"

She's by your side so quickly it's almost like she forgot about the intervening space. "Yes. Of course."

As per usual, you close the door to the off-key hum of your wards grinding to life. It sounds—both metaphorically and literally—inelegant, but you have lived in this room long enough to impress even the most hardened of hermits. Is it any wonder that you've stacked so many protections the very air drives you into the floor when they're active? Ruri almost collapsed the first time; probably the increased sensitivity of a Sage. Now she only flinches – if she was stronger, she probably wouldn't have even blinked.

There's room for improvement, of course: you can see it at a glance. But you've got far too much to do first before you get around to that.

You inhale, long and deep. You taste smoke and stone, the honey-sweet spice of Ruri's skin, and the fading fresh-grass summer of your Light. You are home, with naught but a beautiful girl and your own glory for company.

Somewhere, Kalawarner is weeping with jealousy.

You exhale.

"Don't get lost."

With that, you start to move. Ruri keeps pace beside you; not quite the image you might want to send, but it's that or she's ten feet behind you so your wings don't smack her in the face with every step. You're petty, but not _that_ petty. The halls are fairly empty – this area of the Grigori's headquarters is predominated by living quarters for the Fallen and, rarely, their particularly-trusted servants. Between the prevalence of teleportation—whether borrowed from someone else or not—and the vast array of distractions elsewhere, it's rare to see anyone actually _walking_ around here unless they have a good reason for it.

Most of the reason they're even _in_ this section to begin with makes you glad for soundproofing. You might be part of an organisation literally called the Watchers, but you prefer your voyeurism by choice.

(Your choice, that is).

In the end, you make it out into the Grigori proper before you actually stumble across anyone. The hall opens up into a vast, cavernous basilica, crowned in gleaming, golden filigree. Long oak tables polished to shine scatter themselves across the marble floor – at one, a pair of Fallen sit in the dense quiet so common to lovers. Abijah is even feeding Rubar a bite of pastry as their wings—two pairs each—tangle together. How sickeningly romantic.

You intend to pass them without comment only because you know they'll make one for you; sure enough, Rubar glances away from Abijah at the sound of footsteps, a faint flush visible even on the forge-bronze tan of his face. It collapses into amusement when he notices you.

"Raynare?" he asks. "What's with the illusion?"

Abijah sighs. His own glance is—not apologetic, but not spiteful either.

Both of them summarily ignore Ruri.

There is more art in the curious arch of your eyebrow than most museums. "Illusion? I thought you were too skilled to be confused by such a third-rate sorcerer, Rubar. Don't tell me you've lost your edge in your dotage."

The joke, of course, is that Rubar is barely three hundred.

"It wouldn't surprise me if you scavenged the scraps of something more impressive," he replies. "Even old dogs can learn new tricks."

It reminds you of a song. _Now he's gone and he's calling me a bitch again_. You ought to thank him for the compliment.

"True," you say instead, "that is, technically, exactly what happened. I commend you on your insight."

He bows mockingly. "My thanks. Though I'm much more interested in _why_ you're pretending you've got four wings instead of two. Is it to impress the girl?"

Ruri opens her mouth, and you step on her foot.

"Come now, Rubar. Keep up. I never said anything about _pretending_."

He blinks, once, and then laughs, low and smooth as silk on glass. "I thought those sorts of delusions were supposed to finish at fourteen, not fourteen hundred."

Interestingly, Abijah beats you to the correction, laying a hand over Rubar's. "She's older than I am, Ru. Don't be silly."

He turns to you.

"Though I confess you've confused me too, Raynare. I can't see through the illusion either, and I don't remember you ever being that good. I'm impressed."

By impressed, of course, Abijah means he wants to flatter you into giving up your secrets. Perfectly understandable, but you'll have to disappoint him.

"You're too kind," you reply. "Though perhaps _this_ will make things a little clearer."

 _Let there be Light_.

Your soul bleeds from your body, as languid and lazy as an afternoon in spring. It pools into the air until the puff of your breath is a hot thrill of power, until your skin shimmers with the radiance of ever-distant stars. You flare your wings and stare down Rubar not as inferior but as _equal_.

Your eyes are as sharp as cut amethysts; your voice is the edge of a long blade.

"Tell me I'm lying _one more time_."

Rubar is speechless. Abijah—sun-gold hair still fluttering in the aftershock of your glory—is not. "What Sacred Gear did you steal to let you do _that?_ "

It is, in hindsight, the obvious assumption. In reply, you twirl like a giddy schoolgirl, showing off every sin-stained feather. For some reason, Ruri giggles. "Do I look like I'm using one?"

"Of course you are," Rubar recovers enough to say. "Nobody can fool God. Nobody's even _seen_ Ophis in centuries. And you couldn't survive the Dimensional Gap. Not as you are now, let alone before. Is it some strange subspecies of Twice Critical? They are quite... common."

How rude.

"No Sacred Gear." You spread your arms wide. "No trickery. No lies. This third-rate sorcerer is a first-rate miracle. You can see it, even if you don't believe it – 'for indeed it is not the eyes that go blind, but it is the hearts' and all that."

Reaching over, you pat Rubar on the shoulder. A falling thief would be less condescending. "Don't worry. You'll believe it too, soon enough."

You turn away, tossing a jaunty salute over your shoulder. "See you round, Abijah."

The basilica is not far behind you when Ruri speaks. "You enjoyed that, didn't you?"

Your laughter is as bright as bells. "Of course I did. Abijah's okay, but Rubar can go fuck himself. We worked together for a while, back in the nineteenth century, and let me tell you – if I wanted to spend that much time around an asshole, I'd have transmuted myself a dick."

Ruri's spluttering scandalisation is adorable.

"What?" you ask, as innocent as a child. "He wouldn't enjoy it otherwise."

Steel replaces stone under your feet as you turn down one particular hall. In the distance, you hear footsteps. Too heavy to be Fallen. Probably some scurrying wretch sent to fulfill their master's demands. Not worth stopping to impress.

Two corners later, you make a turn past a laboratory and nearly walk into the Slash Dog.

He's holding a couple of bottles of wine in his hands; one's smoking from the top, and the other can only faintly be seen beneath the shimmering, sky-blue ice that covers it. You step out of his way without a second's thought, and he nods what he probably imagines is politely—like you're doing him a favour out of common respect rather than the knowledge that it would take him more effort _not_ to kill you than otherwise—as he passes you and steps into the same laboratory you just went by.

Almost as soon as the door closes, Ruri speaks. "You know, the illusion didn't really capture how handsome he is."

"I can't say I've ever noticed."

For a human, he's probably impressive, but your type of man is more likely to drink the bar dry than run it.

(Because your main objection is, of course, his _hobby_ ).

Above, the stark, snow-crisp white of the science division's magelights—well, _a_ science division's magelights, more accurately—is replaced by the pale, effervescent burn of torches. You don't know why Azazel decided to mandate the change for every set of laboratories; he said something about creating the right atmosphere, but you're not sure how the lighting would interfere with proper experimentation. He's much wiser than you are, though, so it must have been necessary.

Another minute or so passes in silence.

"This has been a pretty long walk," Ruri says eventually. "My feet are getting tired."

You raise an eyebrow.

"Metaphorically tired. What are we doing – trying to cross half this building or something?"

"Or something," you agree. It's not as if you've been partly dawdling in the hopes of passing by a couple more people to show off to. Perish the thought.

A rustle of wings. You glance up, eyes trailing over a particularly lurid depiction of the Last Supper—certainly they were supping on _something_ —to spot Eldad swooping through the rafters. Or, at least, he would be if there were any rafters. Thankfully for him, given how abruptly he stalls and double-takes in the air when he sees you, there aren't. A moment later, he's on the ground, six wings snapping out of reality as he lands so gracefully the edges of his cassock don't even ripple with the impact.

"Raynare!" he says with a grin as bright as summer. "You succeeded!"

"Not in the way you're imagining, Eldad." You chuckle at his confusion. "Well, sort of. I had a Sacred Gear for a few minutes, but that didn't pan out."

"I am not sure I understand." He looks you up and down. "I was under the impression that the Ritual did not borrow – it _took_."

Eldad shakes his head the same way an owl might; a short, sharp jerk to one side then another.

"No matter. I suppose I should have expected an artist to be cryptic. Congratulations, regardless. I hope you will share the story with me some day."

"Sooner that you might think," you reply, "if everything works out."

"I'm glad. Farewell, Raynare."

A flurry of wind throws your hair in disarray as Eldad launches himself back into the air, soaring over your head. A brief flicker of jealousy is quickly quashed; you'll fix your own flight eventually. Ah well. You didn't expect to meet Eldad this early; you haven't seen him in awhile. It'll be nice to catch up properly, now that you're no longer his complete inferior.

"Artist?" Ruri asks. Full of questions today, this one. "I wouldn't have picked it."

"As much as I might regret not Falling sooner, I _was_ once an Angel. We all had our hobbies."

Silly Ruri. Did she think your skill with—and preference for—illusions came from nowhere?

"Fair enough, I guess," she says. "You should show me your work someday!"

"I already have, in a manner of speaking."

Your feet turn you down a flight of stairs, each step the slap of iron against stone. (What? Of course you own bladed heels. What self-respecting woman with the sort of grace and balance necessary to tiptoe on cobwebs doesn't?) Thankfully, you're almost there, assuming the department hasn't relocated in the pursuit of superior feng shui again. You're not sure what's worse: Munkar's obsession with the concept, or the way Nakir does nothing to stop him.

One last left turn, and you're there. The door stands tall and proud – this time it's soft bamboo, faintly smoking with incense and covered in half-a-hundred Chinese proverbs. _Zì yóu zì zài_ , indeed. At least they haven't freely and easily fucked off halfway across the Grigori again like the last time you went to find them. You rap your knuckles on the door—as best you can can when the wood bounces so enthusiastically it wouldn't have been out of place in the descriptions of some tawdry romance novelist—and wait.

A couple of seconds later, it slides open with a creak so loud it could only have been deliberate.

"Ah, Raynare," Munkar says, standing in the entrance. He tilts his head up to look you in the eyes. "I've been meaning to speak to you myself. Welcome!"

You nod in greeting, and step through. Ruri trails behind you; that's fine for now, but she'll have to step up soon enough. This is her show, after all. You're just here for the introductions.

"This is Ruri," you say, resting your fingers on her bare shoulder. They linger on the heat of her skin—so warm it feels like you're dipping them in fire—just long enough to flirt with the line between affectionate and possessive. "My apprentice. I think you'll want to speak with her far more than me."

"Oh?" He turns to face her. From this angle, his scars are far more striking; the hole in his cheek is no smaller than it was when you first met, and even his hair—as stiff and pale as bone—can't fully conceal the dark, sickly gash in his neck. It's a stark contrast to the steel-carved slant of his jaw and the taut strength of his arms. Munkar has the ruined perfection of a statue long since vandalised; his flaws merely serve to emphasise what he might once have been. "Why is that?"

"My sister was the kitsune who was killed," Ruri says, remarkably steadily, "and I can give you one of the Masters of the White Chrysanthemums to interrogate."

"Can, not will," he replies. Each word is accompanied by a soft, wet whistle; it makes him sound a little like a snake. "I assume you want something in return?"

"I want to join the investigation."

"This is a serious matter. Lord Azazel wouldn't want us to ruin our chances of success by letting an amateur tag along and muck everything up."

"I know Kyoto better than you do," she—probably—bluffs, "and I can move around the city without needing a disguise because nobody cares who I am."

Looks like she's remembered a few more of the things you've told her.

"I also have someone you can use to get access to the White Chrysanthemums," she continues, "who I'll only give you if you let me in."

She pauses. It's so obviously deliberate that it goes straight past theatrical and into melodramatic. Maybe you'll have to teach her to act as well.

"Oh, and I'm a Sage."

"A Sage?" Nakir steps out from the other room, eyes as bright as emeralds. "You should have mentioned that sooner! Quick, come here, I need you to look at something for me."

He bustles over, grabs Ruri's hand, and practically drags her away from you and Munkar. She looks over her shoulder at you, her face a delicious mixture of confusion and apprehension – naturally, you smile and do nothing about it. You'd give her a thumbs-up, too, if it wasn't so undignified.

The door to Nakir's laboratory closes, and you turn to Munkar.

"You didn't seem surprised to see me," you note. "Of all people, I'd have assumed… well, you know."

"Lord Azazel came to me earlier today," he says, "and filled me in on a few issues of importance: you chief among them. I have had time to prepare."

Involuntarily, your eyes flicker over his shoulder.

"It won't work for anyone else." Your tone is—not gentle, but not caustic either. You can spare the sarcasm for a few minutes. "I barely understand why it worked for _me_."

Munkar shrugs. "I abandoned hope a long time ago, Raynare. What does it matter to me if others find it?"

He steps away, back to the monstrous mess of pins and strings scattered across a corkboard that dominates the room. A couple of screens lay abandoned to one side.

"I guess we'll take on your toy. Cooperative Sages are hard to find. Is there anything you can tell me that she can't?"

"Nothing that springs to mind," you say. "She was there for most of my investigation, and I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have found something you didn't. You can always find me if it turns out you need anything more."

"True enough."

"Well, good luck." You're stepping out the door before you realise there's one more thing you ought to say. "Oh, and try to return Ruri to me in one piece. I'd hate to see all my effort go to waste."

Munkar chuckles. "I'll do my best."

"See you round, Munkar."

With that, you leave.

There's work to be done.


	57. Entelechy 8-1

"I have a gift for you, Raynare."

You do not scream.

Rather, you turn around slowly, though not _so_ slowly that it could be taken for a snub. Kokabiel is tall, never bothers to hide any of his ten wings, and so powerful even just the weight of his gaze warms your skin like the afternoon sun. He is loud the way lions are, and he should _not_ be able to sneak up behind you without even bothering to muffle his presence.

Nevertheless, he did.

"Thank you, my lord," you say. You're not at all surprised that people are approaching you, in the wake of Azazel's announcement a day or so ago about your achievement to the whole of the Grigori, but you expected most of them to be your newfound lessers or those particularly noted for their ambition. Kokabiel wasn't even there in the crowd that day—or on the podium flanking you like Baraqiel or Penemue—and of all those to be the first to speak to you in the aftermath, he wouldn't have been on the list to begin with. "You honour me. May I ask what it is?"

Kokabiel plucks a box from the empty air in front of him, and hands it to you. Plain, uncarved wood without a hint of elegance or refinement: it's so mundane and boring that you blink in incomprehension. This is less a container than an insult – a statement that whatever rests inside is not worth even the flicker of attention a man like Kokabiel would need to conjure something far more impressive.

A statement that _you_ are not worth the flicker of attention.

You glance up at Kokabiel. He seems amused.

Very politely, you open th— _oh_.

Your laughter is high and wildly amused: at the contents, at your own hubris and arrogance for thinking you mean enough to Kokabiel in any sense but the abstract that he'd want to _deliberately_ offend you, and at the knife-edged glee that rises within you like smoke before a flame.

Freed Sellzen's head, frozen in stasis, stares back at you.

"I had considered permitting him to live," Kokabiel says, "after a suitable reminder of his place. Men such as he are easy to find, but not within the Church – unpredictable madmen are useful tools to obfuscate your true purpose when your enemy must consider them an independent threat. But then I learned what you had done. What you had _become_."

His gaze, falcon-sharp, cuts across your wings.

"I love my people." There is a sincerity in his voice to make any great romantic seethe with envy. "We are each of us one step from perfection, slivers of the infinity of God broken at the root in the same way you break a bone to heal it stronger. We have no laws and only a single limit – or so we thought. We are clever and quick and _free_. Heaven is a relic of the past, and Hell is a rotting wound. Alone among the Three Factions it is _we_ who should inherit the Earth.

"And it is _you_ , Raynare, who has provided me with the final, eternal proof of why. You have shattered the only truth that could ever have held us back. You have snapped the mandate of Heaven across your knee. You have secured our future in a way even I have never managed simply by _existing_."

He reaches out, and rests a hand on your shoulder. It is the first time Kokabiel has ever touched you.

"You are a hero to our race, Raynare, and the very sight of you has steeled my resolve like nothing else. For that, the head of the yapping cockroach who abandoned you to die is the least of the gifts I could offer. If you ever have need of me, call. I will answer."

He releases you, but you're so dazed by his words you don't notice until he's walking away.

"Thank you, Raynare," he says. "I hope that we will talk again soon."

For a time, you stand there, stunned. Kokabiel called you a hero. _Kokabiel called you a hero_. Azazel was just as effusive with his praise, but he always is. His kindness is part of what draws you to him. The men and women _Kokabiel_ praises are those like Dumah. Kushiel. Atid. Legends of war and violence and glory, who fell under the weight of ten thousand corpses – or stood above ten thousand more.

Not people like _you_.

And yet, he did.

You leave your room with a smile, wide and bright with satisfaction. It's still on your face when you enter the nearest dining hall and it goes quiet, like the hush of a church service. (Complete with the two children whispering at the back). Thankfully, your stomach doesn't rumble with hunger, and so the scene isn't spoiled. You take an empty seat, the thick, black stone cool and comfortable beneath you.

Resting a hand on the far paler marble—an almost-perfect match to the hue of your skin—of the table, your Light blooms across the circle carved into the rock. Even you can't decipher every symbol that makes it up, or follow the way some of those trailing threads seem to have an open relationship with three-dimensional space, but you _do_ know how to use it: with a rush of displaced air, a particularly rare steak and accompanying plate appears above the circle. A second, sharp twist of Light around your hand lets you slice it in half by dragging a finger across it, and it's time to eat.

Or, at least it would be if you weren't joined by Eldad on the stool next to you. He taps a few symbols himself, and a serving of Devonshire tea is in front of him. He frowns, slightly—likely at the quality, though they look perfect to you—but begins slicing one scone in half with the starsilver knife accompanying the fine bone china setting.

"I am glad Lord Azazel did not tell the whole tale of your ascension," Eldad says, "else I would not be able to claim that you still owed me it."

You arch an eyebrow. " _Owe_ is a strong word."

"We have each known the other since before you left the First Heaven, and still you are as you ever were." He pauses, still chuckling. "Well, I suppose that's not strictly correct."

His eyes flick to your wings and then back to his plate, where he's now spreading what your nose tells you is strawberry jam—only half a shade brighter than his hair—and cream across the scone. Once that's done, he carefully cuts it into quarters, and spears one delicately with a fork before lifting it up. There is an elegance to him completely at odds with the way you stain your fingers biting deep down into one half of your steak – blood spills across your lips and the backs of your hands, but that's how you like it. You can fake refined civilisation when you want to, but there's something eminently _satisfying_ about eating the way nature intended.

(That, and right now you're lazy with triumph, like a great cat curling in the sun after the hunt).

"I am who I am," you say, shrugging. Eldad's one to talk. If not for the colour of his wings, he'd be the same, carefully deliberate man who once spoke to you of the beauty in God's every word. So much so that there are those who wonder how he Fell at all. "But don't worry, I'll tell you."

"Wonderful!" The rest of his scone is quickly—though not hastily—eaten, and you take the chance to savour your own meal further. It's charred, and a little bloody; your teeth sink into the meat with ease as you luxuriate in the taste and the swell of juice in your mouth. Ah. Delicious.

Eldad sets his cutlery down the way a woman might her wedding ring, and turns to face you. His arms strain against the sleeves of his cassock as he folds them, each so thick with muscle they seem to have their own gravity. People often imagine Angels as if their bodies were sleek and their bones were air, all gentle power and resplendent grace. They are usually right – but there is nothing _gentle_ about the clifflike cut of Eldad's jaw or the way he can circle both your wrists with his thumb and forefinger. His back is broad enough to support sixteen wings, let alone six, and you can cosily sit on one of his thighs.

If he were human, you imagine he'd look quite exaggerated, but the perfection of an Angel is such that even his physical absurdity seems _right_ , like the world around him is at fault for being too small.

"So," he says, like a priest preparing for the confessional, "what story shall you sing for me today, Raynare?"

You snort. "The only singing around here should be of my praises, and you're taking up valuable time I'd set aside for it. Besides, doesn't your favourite playwright have something to say about brevity?"

"A fair point," Eldad allows, inclining his head. "Though, as always, you pay far too much attention to the opinions of others. You were not weak or worthless then, and you are not strong or significant now. You are _you_ , and that is enough."

Not significant? You are the greatest miracle this world has _ever seen_.

Eldad raises a hand, palm out, no doubt reading the slowly-sharpening curve of your smile. "I did not mean it like that, Raynare. Of course what you have done is incredible. Absurd. If not for the evidence of my own eyes, impossible. I am in genuine awe. But your mistake is to believe that validates you. You do not _need_ validation. No one does."

"It's been a long time since I cared for your philosophy, Eldad," you say, voice quiet. "Or your preaching."

"I know." He shrugs helplessly, the motion an almost startling contradiction to the stone-carved strength of his shoulders. "But even if you've given up on me, I haven't given up on you. Or anyone."

You sigh, long and heavy, like the air in your lungs is an anchor cast out so you're not set adrift. "We've avoided this conversation for six hundred years. I think it can wait another half-hour or so, don't you?"

"Very well." He sounds reluctant, but he doesn't pressure you. He never has. "Please. Tell me your story."

So you do.

Eldad, fittingly, is a _phenomenal_ listener. In the light of the thousand-flame chandelier above, the emeralds of his eyes glitter with anticipation, joy, amazement, or whatever best suits what he's just heard. The weight of his attention is almost physical, as if, for as long as you speak, he breathes only because you exist. You don't share some of your less spectacular moments—there's significantly less fainting after you develop teleportation, for one—or some of your secrets, because there's a whole hall of Fallen who may or may not be spying on the two of you – but you have to actively remember not to.

The problem with Eldad is that he's comfortable.

It makes it easy to forget the two of you live very different lives.

"...then I caught his sword. It melted between my fingers, and I speared him to the floor. After that, Lord Azazel asked me to return, so I did. Now I'm here."

"And I am glad for it." Eldad's smile, bright and glorious, warms your skin like sunlight. "I truly am."

Then he sobers. "But be careful, Raynare. You enjoy the favour of Lord Azazel—and, I think, others—because of what you now represent, but we are fundamentally creatures of lust. Avarice. Greed. There are those among us who will see you as a means to an end – even if that means is _your_ end. And they might be the least of your problems, once the truth leaks out."

"I know that much. I'm not a fool, Eldad." Your voice is so flat it could have been ironed. "Lord Azazel already told me there's a Seraph poking around after me, or at least after what happened."

"I do not think you a fool." He shakes his head. "Just that you _can be_ foolish. And I would hate to see you lost or led astray because of it."

The worst part is that—if recent experience has told you anything—he's not wrong.

(This, too, is a recurring theme when it comes to Eldad).

"Yeah." Your voice is as close to conciliatory as your pride allows. "So I've noticed."

Eldad raises an eyebrow, and you smile, a little wryly. "Let's just say there were a few moments in that story I didn't want to share in public."

In the silence that follows, you sketch out a quick pattern of Light across the runic circle, and two slices of carrot cake replace your now-empty plate. You flick one across to Eldad, not as thank-you, or apology, or—look, you don't _need_ a reason to be nice any more than you need a reason not to be. You can do what you want.

"My thanks," he says, bowing his head with a glacier's grace. It's still faintly surprising that every shift of his body isn't accompanied by the sharp crack of splintering stone or the groan of steel on steel, given what he looks like, and you've known him since two hours after you were made.

The two of you finish eating at roughly the same time, and soon after, Eldad stands, clapping a hand on your arm. The touch is heavy, and not just with affection. It's like you're being hugged by a boulder.

"Well, I must be off, I have a sermon to attend. I hope to see you again."

"Of course you do," you say with a smug tilt of your chin, "everyone does."

Eldad chuckles, deep and smooth. "Ah, there she is again. Go with grace, Raynare, and be well."

He lets you go, and walks away.

On the opposite side of the room, Ammiel enters the hall. Beneath the bright marble, she shines even brighter, a sleek, star-gold silhouette. She looks around, and the moment her eyes alight on you, she makes a beeline straight for your table.

Well.

That's convenient.

"Ammiel!" you say when she nears. "I was actually just about to start looking for you."

"Quite." This close, her hair—a shade of blonde best described as conceptual—less frames her body than cloaks it entirely. "I believe you were one of the last people to see my daughter alive. I'd like to know what happened."

"This conversation is exactly the reason I was planning to find you. But I think we'd both prefer to have it elsewhere."

You promised Ammiel truth, even if she doesn't know it yet. But you'll be damned—well, not that it's really possible for you to be _more_ damned than you are already—if anyone _else_ gets it except those who've already been told. And this dining hall is about as public as it can get.

Ammiel nods. "Of course. Shall we go? My office should be more private."

"Sure."

You step out from your seat, and follow Ammiel. This could be unfortunate. You'd very much rather _not_ tell a probably-grieving mother that you basically got her daughter killed while standing in the heart of that mother's power. But anything you do to imply that… well, someone like Ammiel is going to put the pieces together very quickly anyway, and better that she explodes behind soundproof walls than in the middle of oft-used thoroughfares.

Besides, she won't kill you! You're much too important for that.


	58. Entelechy 8-2

Ammiel's office is best described as distant.

The walls are the colour of the ocean, the ceiling high and painted to match the sky. _Which_ ocean—and which sky—varies by the minute. Her desk is plain metal, her files organised neatly into a stack of transparent, crystal shelves. The seat she studies you from could have been stolen from any office boardroom in the world, and is in every way identical to the one you sit in opposite her (though hopefully not _in opposition_ to her). A soft, sighing sort of song drifts in the background until Ammiel snaps her fingers, cutting it off.

The room is simultaneously refreshingly open and starkly bare.

There's a metaphor in there, somewhere. There usually is, with people like Ammiel.

She folds her arms beneath her… well, there's not much there _to_ be beneath, but anyway. What most humans would find stand-offish you find mildly reassuring; the hands of any Fallen Angel are weapons, and Ammiel has put hers away. Bright blue eyes—the same shade as Mittelt's—study you with impatient curiosity as the gentle breeze circulating the room sifts through her endless, fresh-straw curls almost in admiration.

"I'm listening," she says, her whole body taught with anticipation

You couldn't tell.

Internally, you sigh. This is it. The moment—quite literally—of truth. It's tempting to prevaricate. To evade, to delay, to _run_. No matter your resolve, there'll always be a part of you that thinks of nothing and no-one except freedom: from control, from care, from _consequences_.

It took you a very long time to understand that freedom is a _choice_.

Today, you choose otherwise.

"Lord Azazel gave me a mission a couple of months ago: to supervise a human brat with a Sacred Gear that was reportedly powerful. It was given only to me, and no-one else. I recruited Kalawarner, Dohnaseek, and Mittelt for a second purpose. A nun, Asia Argento, had a Sacred Gear known as Twilight Healing—yes, that Twilight Healing—and had been excommunicated from the Church for using it to heal a Devil. I'd convinced her to join us, but that was a lie. I planned to rip out her Sacred Gear and take it as my own; the others agreed to help me, mostly in exchange for riding my star to prominence."

(What bitter irony is this, that the mistakes that killed them all have led you to the same end they'd wanted to follow you to).

"I kept this a secret from not only Lord Azazel, but the rest of the Grigori apart from them. It was to be _my_ moment. _My_ triumphant return. While we waited for Argento to arrive for the ritual, I investigated the boy from afar. There was nothing remarkable about him except his perversion, but I had been told he was mighty. I thought that meant _dangerous_. So I lured him on a date and killed him."

"Lord Azazel threw that policy out almost twenty years ago," Ammiel says.

"Yes. I know." If she thinks that's the worst example of your judgement, she's in for a wild surprise. "He had a hole in him, and he was only mortal. I left him to die. I'm pretty sure he did. But this was a town ruled by the Gremory and Sitri clans, and the Lucifer's little sister resurrected him. I wouldn't learn this until she drove Dohnaseek off, who'd found the boy wandering the city later on and assumed him a Stray when he didn't respond to any of the usual queries.

"At some point, he met up with Argento, who'd arrived and was asking for directions to the abandoned church we were holed up in, as I hadn't told her much else other than the name of the town. He brought her straight to us, presumably without knowing it. I performed the usual preparations for the ritual, and Argento fled us because of them. Well, because of them and the fact I allowed an insane Exorcist to take her along on a murder mission to kill a few Devil contractors within the city. Regardless, I set out to recapture her, only to find her enjoying a day out in the city with the boy. So I took her back despite his attempts to stop me, and discovered his Gear was apparently only Twice Critical.

"On the night of the ritual, the boy—who'd somehow grown incredibly attached to her in a very short time, probably because she was the first girl his age not disgusted with his general existence—led two other members of his Peerage to rescue her. I don't know how they knew what day to strike on, but they were a little too late: I'd already extracted the Gear. Mittelt, Dohnaseek, and Kalawarner weren't there, as I'd sent them away on the off chance they might betray me and take the Gear for themselves."

The only one you'd been truly worried about was Mittelt; Kalawarner would never, and Dohnaseek just plain didn't care. But she needed supervision, and the only way to ensure it didn't _look_ like you were sending her away specifically was to send them all with some made-up mission to wreak havoc on a few other Devil contractors as a distraction. Sellzen—your smile, had you let it bleed across your lips, would have been sharp with hate—was a fool, but he'd inspired the idea.

"The exiles we'd managed to recruit engaged the Knight and the Rook. The boy rushed to Argento and took her away at first, ignoring the fight. I went to follow him, but the Knight cut me off, both figuratively and literally. I healed the wound with my Gear, broke past him, and ended up confronting Hyoudou—the boy—in the basement. We fought, and I kept beating him down until it turned out that it wasn't Twice Critical, but rather the Boosted Gear."

The fact Ammiel doesn't react—not even to widen her eyes—at that revelation is, shall you say, _mildly concerning_. Instead, she sits there, still watching. Still listening. Still waiting.

"He knocked me out, and when I was woken up, Gremory's whole Peerage were there. Apparently she and her Queen had wandered out to slaughter Kalawarner, Dohnaseek, and Mittelt before coming to finish the job with me. And they did. I didn't see how the others died, and nobody saw fit to explain.

"Then I woke up in an alley a day later, and the rest, as they say, is history."

There's more to talk about, but she needs to know the context before she can start asking questions or you can offer what other details you have on the events.

Over the course of the conversation, Ammiel has grown still. The breeze has died away. The walls have frozen on the crest of a tsunami; the roof displays only a storm. All you can hear is your breath—not hers—and your heartbeat. The air is cold and biting. It tastes like the edge of a blade.

You dare not break the silence.

Even _you_ have the empathy (or maybe the self-preservation) to recognise when a moment belongs to someone else.

When she speaks, the fury in her voice is so sudden and savage that it rakes through you like the claws of some great beast. The room trembles before—or perhaps _because of_ —her rage, and she very, very deliberately uncrosses her arms to lay her hands flat on the table. The trailing sleeves of her rose-red dress flap in non-existent wind, and the desk hisses and spits around her fingers, the smell harsh and acrid.

"So you are telling me," she says, "that my daughter died because of your _petty stupidity?_ That I lost the one thing I love in the whole of Creation because you wanted _power?_ That I have not even her _ash_ because _all you could think of was your glory?_ "

The whole of her desk has deformed beneath her palms. It does not creak or groan with the strain; it _screams and smokes_ as Ammiel's rage sublimates steel. You flinch from the ambient heat, Light suffusing your skin so you're not roasted alive by sheer proximity. Her files have long since been burnt to ash in their shelves, but the crystal that once held them remains shining and pure. It scatters the searing radiance that surrounds it like the corona of a star.

"I know I fucked up," you admit. The insults are all the more galling for the fact they are—mostly—accurate, but you'd rather not get into a pissing match with someone who seems to be doing their level best to induce nuclear fusion in their local vicinity. "Trust me. I _know_. I died because of it, too. But I— "

"Then maybe you should have stayed dead."

Your chair slams into the back wall and splinters on impact with the sudden _snap_ of shattering aluminium; you're on your feet and two steps removed from Ammiel before it's halfway across the floor. No spears sing into your grip, but you pull your Light close and let it rise.

It should say everything it needs to that the outside world _still_ feels hotter than your bones.

By now, there is nothing left of Ammiel's desk. The carpet is a sea of flame, crackling merrily. Her eyes are cut sapphires lit inside by supernovae; her hair snarls around her body like a thousand snakes dipped in sunfire. You stop breathing altogether. It hurts too much. She lifts a hand, so bright it's like the world itself has collapsed to incandescence, and points to the door.

"Leave."

Some mad instinct keeps you in place for half a second longer. "Ammiel, I'm s—"

" _Leave!_ " Her voice is a shriek of glass on glass, a firework howling through the air, a splinter of rage and pain and _hate_.

You do.

Thank God the hallway is empty, because your whole body is shaking, and you're fairly sure every inch of your skin is equal parts scorched or peeling. A quick twist of Light settles an illusion of normalcy over you, just to avoid anyone asking you why you smell as if you've been swimming in a volcano, and you very carefully do not limp toward your quarters, regardless of the blisters that speckle your feet like a leopard's spots. At least the marble beneath you is almost as cool as the snow whose colour it shares.

That… honestly, it went about as well as expected. You've absolutely made another enemy today, but unless you had just plain lied to her face about the entire thing, you were always going to. All that matters now is how you're going to deal with the aftermath: for the moment, that means relaxing in your room for the rest of the day until you once again look as perfect as you should. Maybe you'll fetch Ruri and start filling her in on the basics of Enochian while you wait.

When you arrive, sliding a hand down the thick, smooth ebony of your door to open up your wards, you barely manage to slip off the ash-black remnants of your clothes before somebody knocks on it. A quick flex of Light taps one particular corner of the sealing matrix that binds the protections together, and the air before you shimmers into the shape of… Ruri. Well, that's convenient.

In response to your will, the door opens just as her fist is about to make contact with it, and she stumbles forward for a split second before recovering, almost tripping over the trailing edges of her shimmering silver kimono. You smirk, but thankfully manage to wipe it from your face faster than she can look up to see you. Red blooms across her cheeks like a lazy sunrise, and she immediately turns away.

Oh, dear.

Did you forget you were naked?

How dreadful.

"Don't be silly, Ruri. You've seen this all before." You pout. "Honestly, I'm feeling a little insulted. Am I really that ugly?"

" _That's not the problem here_."

"No, it's not," you say, collapsing in the Chair and momentarily losing track of anything and everything except _soft_. Your head lolls back into the headrest, the deep black of your hair lost against the deeper black of the leather, and fix your gaze on the sky of diamond stars above. Even the dull itch of your wings beneath your shoulders fades away, and the slowly-rising irritations of your veritable army of blisters—hidden as they still are beneath your illusions—seem far less important. "The problem is that this is my room, and I'll do what I want while I'm here. Just as every other Fallen you may come to visit in time will. These walls are my kingdom, Ruri, and unless you can conquer it, why should I not reign absolute within?"

You hear her open her mouth, only to close it abruptly. When she speaks again, she sounds wry. "So you lounging in your chair without a stitch of clothing is actually you giving me another valuable lesson on Grigori etiquette?"

"Of course," you reply. "I'm such a thoughtful teacher, aren't I?"

"That's one word for it."

You laugh, a few bright, songbird chirps. "I was planning to look for you, but what brings you here?"

"Do you have any pads?"

You blink. "Hmm?"

"Pads? You know, one of the things you use when your period arrives?"

Oh, right.

Ruri's not an Angel.

You probably should have thought of this earlier.

"I don't," you say, and then clarify, "use pads. Or have a period, for that matter."

"Wait, _why?_ "

"I didn't always have a body. This," you run your hands luxuriously down the silk-smooth curves of your shoulders, your sides, and your thighs, "is what I choose to look like, but it's not who I _am_. It's closer to clothing than anything else, if a little tighter bound to my essence than that really suggests. Maybe a puppet would be a better analogy? Point is, I've never had any interest in having children, so I just… didn't bother to include anything that didn't relate to the fun part."

Strictly speaking you could leave out a lot more than that, but—embarrassingly—the closer to human your form, the less effort, concentration, and power it takes to maintain. Some Fallen have strength enough to spare for that, but you don't. Not even now.

"That is _so unfair._ " Ruri's glare is, as always, adorable. You might not be looking at her, but you can still tell. "I wish I could choose like that."

Your smile is insufferably smug. "The perks of being a superior existence."

Ruri ignores that and speaks again, half to herself. "Then what am I supposed to do now?"

"I know a few spells for keeping things clean, if it's urgent. And the mortal realms aren't exactly that far away—figuratively speaking—if you need to go shopping."

"No, it's not urgent." Her voice is flat. "I'm not _that_ careless. I guess I'll just pick them up when we next step out for the investigation."

A thought occurs. "Do you actually have any money?"

She did decide to abandon everything and come here with only the clothes on her back. Thankfully, the two of you are fairly similar sizes, and sorcery makes adjustments easy, so she's been borrowing from your endless closets since she arrived. Not out of any sense of generosity, of course: there's just something so delightfully _possessive_ about seeing her in your clothes, and she does wear them awfully well.

"...no."

You sigh. Honestly, do you have to do everything around here? "Bring my suitcase over."

Kalawarner's wallet is still within it, and you're certainly not giving Ruri access to your _own_ liquidity. You probably have a gemstone or two sitting around the room somewhere, but she'd have to sell them off first and… look, it's just easier this way.

Ruri does so, and—regretfully—you straighten up enough to flick past both the magical and mundane locks. Pulling out what you want, you let the lid slam shut with a heavy _thunk_ and toss the wallet to Ruri. She catches it, her ears and tails twitching in surprise and her face faintly puzzled.

"Use that," you say. "Should be enough for any mundane needs left on the cards, and there's a set of notes inside detailing all the numbers and codes you'll require to use any of them."

"Thank you!" Her smile is as bright as the gold of her eyes.

You shrug. "It'd be embarrassing if my apprentice had to go around begging, whether it was for money or work. And speaking of apprentices, it's time I started teaching you Enochian. Your first lesson starts tomorrow morning, after breakfast."


	59. Entelechy 8-3

Eldad's church is a place of dizzying wonder.

Once, it was simply his room, but over the years he's remodelled it entirely. Twin rows of pale, moonstone braziers crowned in gold march down the center, spaced just far enough apart that you can walk with one on either side and the tips of your wings never run the risk of being set alight. Mahogany pews carved in long, swooping lines that make you think of flying sit on the outside of each brazier, all the better to luxuriate in the rich, raw beauty of the incense they burn; each smoky breath reminds you of soft clouds beneath the sun, of grass-stained limbs and lips wet from kissing.

An altar sits triumphant at one end of the room, a great, glorious slab of orichalum that almost seems to glow from within, reflecting the radiance of half a hundred candles floating in alcoves carved into the plain marble walls. To look upon it is to see Light frozen into physical form. It is so holy it almost hurts.

But even this pales in comparison to the immaculate landscape that frames it; the seven layers of Heaven, so excruciating detailed you can count every sunshine hair on Michael's head from where he sits with a crowd of lesser Angels, all smiling over some joke he's probably never told. No one man could have finished a third of it in his lifetime.

(Fitting, then, that it was not painted by a man at all).

The floor is a mixture of patterned tiles—alternating obsidian and ivory—except between the altar and the door; a luxurious carpet as deliciously soft as the one in your room, and just the same shade of sunset, covers the path between them and the braziers too. The flames within them flicker without sound. The whole church has a deep, hanging _hush_ to it, each moment weighed down by the shadow of divinity.

Naturally, you break the silence immediately, taking three steps in and spinning to face Ruri. Her face is slack with wonder, and you make no effort to hide the amusement of your tone. "Well, we're here. Pull up a seat and try not to get too high on the smoke."

"Raynare," she hisses, "don't be rude. This place is _beautiful_."

Yes. You know. But if she's learned anything from her time with you, it should be that beauty is most often the easiest lie of all. Eldad may be an honest man, but what he stands for is anything but. Weakness should not be seen as strength.

"Do not worry," comes a voice as deep as the dark between stars, "I take no offence."

The man himself steps out of a door at the back, smiling like a child. For once, he wears not his cassock, but rather a pair of long pants and little else. Perhaps you caught him changing.

"And I am quite sure that God has heard higher heresies than speaking in church."

Beside you, Ruri swallows. Not all women find the sort of man who looks like he could bench-press a mountain attractive, but for those who can… well, there are few finer examples than Eldad. His chest is as broad and imposing as the face of a cliff, each muscle a study in anatomical perfection; his skin is as smooth as freshly-burnished bronze, and much the same colour. The slightest twist of his torso whenever he takes a step suggests a coiled, primal strength that sends authors reaching for words like 'rugged' and 'smouldering'.

You lean down so that, with each word, your lips brush the soft fur of Ruri's ears. "Now imagine we're _both_ naked."

She actually chokes.

Your laughter trills like a mockingbird, and even Eldad chuckles briefly. "You should not tease the poor girl, Raynare. I apologise; I was not expecting visitors so soon."

A wave of his hand conjures a shirt—a simple, plain blue—that he tugs on hurriedly. It strains around his body to the degree that it's almost _worse_ than if he'd gone without, but Ruri seems to appreciate the gesture. Certainly her eyes are no longer magnetised to every rippling flex of his stomach as he breathes.

"So," he says, "what brings you here, Raynare and… Ruri, I take it? Not that you are unwelcome, of course. My church is open to all, no matter the hour."

"It's ten o'clock, Eldad. Even if you had to sleep it _still_ wouldn't be early."

He shrugs the way the world might. "I have just returned from Earth. As I understand it, many of my congregation would disagree—mostly the college students, admittedly."

Fair enough.

"I think we're here because she wants to fob off a promise." The amused twitch of Ruri's tails ripple the persimmon silk of her dress. "Raynare said she'd teach me Enochian, but I bet she's just going to ask you to do it."

You're not sure what's worse: that she has such a firm grasp on your general character, or that for once you _weren't_ going to do just that.

(The answer of course, is actually that she had the cheek—and the nerve—to joke about you to your face. Truly you have such a rude and recalcitrant apprentice).

"Oh?" Eldad crosses his arms and arches an eyebrow. "Well, I _am_ something of a teacher, but I am not sure what I think of such behaviour. If you make that sort of commitment, Raynare, you should stick to it. Disappointing your students is unacceptable."

"I don't want to hear that from _you_." The only person who should be teased here is Ruri. This sort of—this sort of _mutiny_ is unacceptable. "And I wasn't going to abandon her, actually. I just wanted somewhere less… distracting than my room to do it."

After all, you can hardly be blamed for what you might do, shut in a bedroom with naught but a beautiful girl for company. Or, rather, what you might convince _her_ to do to you.

He smiles knowingly—whether at your lack of denial of _ever_ being so lazy or the direction of your thoughts, you don't know. It's probably both.

"What do you mean, distracting?" Ruri asks. "Apart from the roof, your room's pretty boring."

How cruel.

"It's not the room I'm referring to, silly Ruri." You favour her with a particularly indulgent stare. "It's the reason you'd be flat on your back staring _at_ that roof in the first place."

Thankfully—for Ruri—Eldad saves her the trouble of replying, because you don't think she's quite capable of it right now. "Discussing extra-marital relations in a house of God? I feel obligated to register my disapproval."

"Please," you snort, "as if that altar hasn't been used for much worse."

"It has not, actually," he returns, "unless there is something you would like to tell me."

You carefully do not reply.

"Wait," Ruri says, "this is an actual church? In the middle of the Grigori? In the middle of _the Underworld?_ "

Eldad nods. His voice, when he speaks, is smooth and patient—given how many times you suspect he's answered similar questions, you're surprised he doesn't have flashcards. "Indeed, it is. After all, it is better to light a candle than curse the darkness. There is not one place that _should_ have a church more than Hell, for who else is most desperately in need of salvation than a sinner? This is, of course, not quite Hell, but every step on the road is worth making."

Ruri blinks. "Are you actually a Fallen Angel?"

Then she pales.

"Sorry, that was really rude!"

She bows in apology. Perhaps all your lessons haven't gone _entirely_ to waste.

"You are forgiven." As always, Eldad's every word sounds like a benediction. Doubly so when he's _actually_ offering one. "But yes, I am."

Ruri goes to say something, and then cuts herself off, shaking her head in a spray of dark hair. As if you and Eldad both can't tell what she was planning to ask.

"She wants to know why you Fell," you say, and luxuriate in Ruri's goldenrod glare. You're certainly repeating yourself, but she's much too cute when she's angry. Seriously. It's like being mauled to death by a baby rabbit.

Eldad's laugh is big and booming, filling the air like the beat of a drum. "Many of us have our traumas or our trivialities, so I can understand the hesitance. You have learned politeness well—despite the example of your master, I suspect."

Ruri snickers as he brushes off your glare the same way you did hers. And for probably the same reasons.

"As for me, I remain one of the few who left Heaven for entirely ideological reasons. I doubt Raynare brought you here for a lecture on theology rather than language, however, so perhaps another time. Make yourselves at home; I will disturb you no longer."

He nods to each of you, bending like a great oak before a greater storm, and goes to turn away.

"W—wait," you say, each word a hesitant push. "I mean, it's your church. You can stay. If I had to endure your rants on the evolution of grammar, so does Ruri. It's only fair."

Eldad looks less surprised than outright shocked. "Are you truly sure?"

"I just spoke to Ruri yesterday about the sanctity of our personal rooms, so I probably shouldn't let you directly contradict that to my face." You carefully study the wall over his shoulder. "Besides, we've avoided it for six hundred years. Maybe—maybe we shouldn't avoid it for six hundred more."

His grin is joy itself, so wide and wondrous it reddens his cheeks to match his hair.

"I'm missing something here," Ruri says, looking between you and Eldad. She steps closer, her shoulder brushing against yours, and lowers her voice. "Am I allowed to ask if he's your ex-boyfriend or something?"

You have to dig your fingers into her arm to stop yourself from collapsing with laughter. You almost tear the tight fabric of your stained-charcoal shirt, such is the violent mirth that shakes your whole body. Eldad's own laughter is gentler, but no less amused for it.

Ruri tilts her head to the side in total incomprehension.

"What?" she asks.

"I am afraid Raynare, lovely as she may be, is not quite my type," Eldad says. "Though I suspect, for the sake of her ego, that I should suggest I am flattered you believe I am in her league."

You're still too busy laughing—high and wild, like the cackling of a crow—to respond to that.

Eventually, you recover enough to let go of her arm and straighten up. You and Eldad. Now _that's_ a punchline. "Never change, Ruri."

"It was just a question." Her pout is, as always, lethal.

With that moment of entertainment over, you suppose you might as well actually get started on why you're here in the first place. "Come on. We've wasted enough time."

You stroll over to the closest pew, and sprawl indolently into the corner closest the brazier. The wood is warm and comfortable beneath your thighs—your shorts are putting the word to good use—and a deep inhale of the smoke flutters your eyes shut with pleasure for a couple of seconds.

"Eldad, do you have a dictionary anywhere?" you ask. "And something to write on?"

A soft bloom of Light against your mind. "I do now."

You look up to see him passing both to Ruri, who lays them down on the bench beside where she sits.

"Thank you." You lift a hand to point one at her. "We'd best start with the basics first. The dictionary's just for you to read through in your spare time, if you're well and truly bored—I don't expect it to be very useful until I think you're up to translating, and that won't be for a while. For now, I'm going to write down each letter of the alphabet, and say them once. You'll repeat it until I'm satisfied with your pronunciation. Once we've been through the alphabet, I'll do the same again, but mix up the order. By the end of today, I expect you to have it fully memorised."

Without waiting for a reply, you tilt your finger up, and trace out two-thirds of the letter T in a line of shimmering gold. It hangs unsupported before you, glittering in the candlelight. "This is _graupha_."

The next few hours proceed much as you intended, if not as you expected. There's a strange sort of triumph in watching Ruri start to _understand_ —a quiet satisfaction that warms the corners of your smile every time she gets it right. Is this why people teach? Not just to show their mastery, to demonstrate their superiority and skill, but because sometimes it can feel like _this?_ How disgustingly soft.

You quiz her again, just to be sure.

Eldad is less help than you thought he'd be; apart from a few suggestions here and there, he seems mostly content to reread a novel— _The Count of Monte Cristo_ —with an easy smile on his face every time he looks up. At one point, he stands and walks away, only to return with three slices of tiramisu and same number of forks. You control the growl of your stomach through sheer force of pride, no matter that you can smell how rich and thick it is from here.

"You're so much nicer than she is," Ruri says to him, pointing at you with a forkful of cake. You're tempted to snap it from the tines while she's distracted. It's _so good._ "Raynare made me pay for my own dessert in Tokyo."

"And who's paying for your _everything_ here, brat?" The incense must be making her light-headed. She hasn't dared treat you so irreverently in public—or at all, really—before. "Be thankful for my magnanimity."

"Ah, it was nothing." Eldad places his fork down on his plate with the delicacy of a man who could break the metal by breathing on it too hard, and smiles at Ruri. You know that smile. It's the one you emulate when you're trying to pretend you don't even know what arrogance _means_. On a good day you can manage a quarter of the sincerity. "I have found a well-done meal often helps in getting someone to stick around long enough to hear me out, be they Angel, Fallen Angel, human, youkai, or anything else. Learning to cook was a selfish decision, really."

"Why tiramisu?" you ask, studying yours. It makes a wet, deliciously squishy noise as you push what's left of the middle layers around. "I'm not complaining—I just thought you preferred savouries."

"I do." His voice reminds you of cracking stone, frozen by night and baked by morn. "But a good host always favours his guests."

You look at him sharply—how did he _know?_ —but all he does is raise an eyebrow with the ponderous dignity of a glacier.

"Yes, Raynare?"

"Nothing," you say, still staring at him. "Don't worry about it."

Ruri clearly isn't, given that she just stole a bite from you while _you_ were distracted.

That little bitch.

"Right!" You clap your hands loudly, startling Ruri so she smudges cream across her rosepetal lips. No, don't get distracted. You can kiss a lot more than that off her another day. "Now that we've had a break, let's get back to work. Your next task, Ruri, is to write out the full Enochian alphabet. I hope you've been remembering what the letters look like."

The dawning panic on her face is almost as delicious as the cake she stole from you.

(You are genuinely impressed when she manages to recall the shapes of a full third on the first attempt. Anger—or at least annoyance—appears a powerful motivator where Ruri is concerned. It seems you were right to see a shadow of yourself in her).

Eventually, she gets them all correct three times in a row, and you decide to call it a day. Or evening, rather. No wonder you're hungry again; it's almost seven o'clock. Might as well grab something for dinner before you figure out what to do while Ruri sleeps.

You bid farewell to Eldad: there's such a thing as _too_ much reconciliation, and you're not sure you appreciate the effect he has on your apprentice. Honestly. Just because he mouths off to you doesn't mean she gets to as well! ...you have to admit, though, that you've missed moments like these. Easy days, easy words, and easy company.

It's probably best not to spend too long in public for a little while longer, though. Not out of cowardice, of course—just enlightened self-interest. Whether you have four wings or not, Ammiel incinerated her entire office and almost everything in it without needing to pull out her own. You've never fought her before, but now you're quite sure you never want to. You'd rather give her a chance to cool off some more, in case she catches you alone again and decides to forget herself.

That means you're eating in. Ruri has her own quarters with the investigation, as she told you on the walk over. You have no need to bring her with you—but you want to. So you do.


	60. Entelechy 8-4

"That was an interesting meeting," Ruri says, sitting cross-legged on your bed. A long-empty bowl—once filled with rice, cut tomatoes, prawns, and chilli—rests in her lap, and she idly twirls a pair of chopsticks in her hand. "I haven't been _that_ actively ignored since Kyoto."

You, of course, lounge in the Chair, your own bowl set to one side and a bottle of half-finished simmerwine trapped between your legs so it doesn't spill. It bubbles, a soft hiss just on the edge of hearing, and even through the glass it's almost hot enough to hurt. The taste still lingers on your tongue—a sharp, rich burn like standing beneath a desert sky, chased by the snap of pepper and the crisp bite of apple.

"Bezaliel's one of Kokabiel's," you say, taking another slow swill of your drink. Ah. Lovely. "They're all pretty racist, to put it bluntly. Like the kitsune, or the old Satans, or the more stupidly orthodox Angels. If you're not Fallen, you don't matter."

The ideology is a tempting one. Perhaps not when taken to its logical conclusion, but you're all for people recognising your innate superiority. The main problem is that you know from long experience that _your_ species has plenty of people who don't deserve your respect either. Certainly you much prefer Ruri to, say, Sayarin. Fuck Sayarin. Your art is _magnificent_.

Ruri stretches, flexing one arm in the air and then the other; you mentally subtract ten points from her dress for not ripping around the chest, given what the arch of her back does to the curve of her front. It wins plenty more for the fit—loose but low-cut—and the way it spills around her legs when she slumps to lay back across your covers, landing with a soft thump, but still. It was originally yours—how dare it betray you this way?

"This whole wing thing is a way bigger deal than I thought, isn't it?" Her tails, gentle explosions of charcoal fur, twitch idly in contentment as she moves to get comfortable. "I knew it wasn't supposed to be possible, but given how everyone I've met who knows we're associated likes to gossip about it, plus that speech by Azazel and how that Bezaliel guy treated you… it's like a kitsune gaining a ninth tail without Lord Inari's blessing. Or at least that's the best example I have."

You send her an affronted glare. God's laws are much more potent than any Shinto upstart's little decrees, thank you very much. Even if you'd never say that to their face.

"Yeah, yeah," she says, fluttering thin, pale fingers in your direction, "you're insulted to compared to something so plebeian. I swear, talking to you is like trying to juggle pufferfish."

You're just tipsy enough to be amused instead of angry. "You know, you've grown awfully bold recently. Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"I'm pretty good at knowing how people are feeling." Her voice resonates half a second longer than it should, like a cymbal struck a little too eagerly. "And you like it when someone sasses you. Maybe you won't _admit_ that you do, but you don't care if they give as good as they get. I think I can guess where you learned it, too."

Okay, you are nowhere near drunk enough for this conversation.

Conveniently, you can fix that.

You upend the rest of the bottle into your mouth, and very, very determinedly do not splutter and cough as it chokes and sears your throat raw on the way down. Your eyes water, briefly, but you blink the tears away before Ruri looks up.

"Did you just scull _half a bottle of simmerwine?_ "

You favour her with a smirk, smug as, well, a girl who's just sculled half a bottle of simmerwine. When you speak, your voice rasps like sandpaper on iron. "You say that as if it's impressive."

"I say that as if it's _insane_. I literally breathed fire the first time I drank that!"

"You get used to it," you say, sinking further into the warm embrace of your seat. Hmm. It's _too_ warm. You should take something off. A quick shimmy strips you of your shorts and shirt, and you kick them away—all that remains is your underwear, though you suppose it's 'underwear' in the same way porn sometimes has a plot. That's _really_ not the point. It feels much better now, though. The dark leather of the Chair is a startling contrast against the pale ethereality of your skin, and with so much flesh deliciously exposed to its comfort you feel almost boneless. "Besides, I like it hot."

You'd give her a meaningful glance if you could be bothered moving that much right now. Alas.

"Don't think you can distract me," Ruri says, though the tightness of her voice suggests it was probably working. "What _is_ the story between you and Eldad? I've never seen you that comfortable with another person—looking back I don't think I've ever _seen you comfortable_ before that moment, actually. Even here, even now, I make one implication and you basically mainline alcohol to deal with it."

Well. She's not _wrong_.

"Eldad was the second person I ever met, after God." Your words sink in the air like the wine sinks into your veins. "You know how you read some shitty romance novel and it throws out a line about 'it feels like I've known you my entire life' and all that? Minus about five minutes, I _have_."

The reverse, of course, is not true. You are old. He is older.

"He's like a mountain," you continue, the slow flood of intoxication washing your thoughts out into the world. "No. That's wrong. Nature can reshape a mountain. Too much wind, too much water, a fault in the earth. They can change. Eldad is like—like the sky. No matter where you are, just look up."

"You sound like you love him," Ruri observes.

Stupid girl.

"Most days I'm not even sure if I like him," you say, listening to the rustle of fabric as Ruri shifts on the bed. "Love's got nothing to do with it."

You lean back, the roof a blurring sea of glittering stars. Much like the room. Huh. You _are_ already drunk.

"It's—look. He taught me a lot. Plenty I listened to. Plenty more I didn't. Looking back, maybe there should have been a little more of the former and a little less of the latter. But it is what it is."

You're amazed you have the energy to point in her general direction, though the empty bottle does droop in your hand, almost slipping out at one point.

"Moral of the story, brat: I know more than you do, even when you think I don't. Remember it."

"I'm… pretty sure that wasn't the moral of that story at all."

"Yeah, you're probably right," you say. "My stories don't really have much to do with morals."

Ruri giggles like a—like a mouse tap-dancing on a xylophone. Mmm. That's a good comparison.

You start giggling too.

It sounds nothing like a mouse tap-dancing on a xylophone.

You stop after a while, distracted by the flash of bare feet on the floor as Ruri slips off the bed to drop her empty bowl somewhere that isn't on top of your sheets. Her nails aren't painted, and there's this long, shallow scar stretching across one heel that wasn't there in Kyoto. Your eyes track her as she moves until you're staring down at your own feet as well. Huh. How'd they get there? You don't remember following her.

It takes you a moment to realise it's actually because she's come to _you_ , and you decide to disguise your confusion with a long, languorous look straight up her body until you meet her gaze. Her legs are deliciously smooth. You want to touch them.

Ruri does an admirable job of ignoring the way you're running your toes across her calves when she speaks. "So, uh, thanks for dinner. I'm going to head back now."

That doesn't sound right.

You hook your legs behind her knees and pull her so she sprawls into your lap. She gasps in surprise, but you're too busy with the lump of soft foxgirl splayed across you—and the unbelievable _fluff_ of her tails curling over your hips—to tease her for it. You breathe in, long and deep; her scent bites at you, smoke spun through with the bittersweet of sakura.

"Raynare?" Her ears twitch adorably. You have to stroke them. So you do.

"I've thought a lot about the things I want to do to you in this chair," you tell her, quite seriously. "Would you like to hear them?"

"I—uh—I really should be goi—" Her voice scatters into a high-pitched squeak when your hands meander their way down her body to rest on the exposed stretch of her thighs, where her dress has bunched up a little beyond propriety. Her skin is hot enough to burn—or at least it seems like it should, with the way it spreads heat from your fingers to your lungs. Each breath feels a little more desperate.

Your laughter lingers on your lips like a kiss.

"Are you _sure?_ "

You lift an arm to curl some of her raven hair, brushing a lock out of her wide-blown, golden eyes. They watch, pinned by the intensity of your stare, as you lean in until your noses brush.

"Go on. Answer me."

She does—and oh, what an answer it is.

* * *

A few days later, you find yourself frantically diving away to avoid your head being seared off by the blade of a Light-forged claymore wider than you are.

"Good, girl! Good!" Bezaliel steps forward in a blurring pattern of too-bright Light and too-sudden slashes, always in your face, always _pushing_. You throw yourself into a somersault, shove yourself to the side in mid-air with a beat of your wings, miscalculate the strength afforded by two rather than one, and hurl yourself straight into the wall with a splintering crash. White stone powders around your shoulder and irritates your throat; your cough turns into a choking gasp when a sizzling wedge of starfire settles under your chin. "That, though? Not so good."

"Watch who you're calling 'girl', _boy_ ," you snap. Where is the respect he showed you in front of Ruri? "I was old before the _idea_ of you."

If you were allowed to use your sorcery, you're sure this would be a very different fight.

"And maybe that'll matter when I'm not holding a sword to your throat," Bezaliel replies easily, snapping his fingers to dismiss it, "but until then, I'll call you whatever I like. Dust yourself off and we'll go again."

You huff, irritated, and do as he says. There's no real malice in it. Well, there is, but it's the malice of a soldier, not an assassin—Bezaliel, you're coming to see, doesn't like _anyone_ who can't put up a good fight, and he's fresh off battering you around the room for most of the morning.

Still pisses you off regardless.

"Now, girl, I've said it once, and I'll say it again: the problem is that you're useless in the air." He shrugs off your glare, which only redoubles as he continues. "You're _also_ useless on the ground, but I can fix that—I _can't_ reteach you to fly. So until you figure that out, keep your feet firmly planted on the floor. Training with restrictions is good every once in a while."

"Are _you_ still going to fly?"

The look he gives you is somewhere between _of course_ and _no fucking shit, you utter moron_.

Then he stabs you in the face.

At the last moment, you twist away, Light flaring a spear in your fist and sharpening a wing in equal measure. You scythe it toward Bezaliel as you spin into a lunge, two killing edges of power set to burn flesh and blacken bone. He slaps away your wing with one of his own and fends off the spear with a nonchalant palm, shimmering with Light the same sky-blue as his hair. Hand and blade meet with a furious hiss, like rain scattered across boiling metal, until his superior strength shoves it aside and you off-balance.

A foot crunches into your temple, and your ears ring as if the whole world's been used for the bell. Some small part of you is vaguely amazed that he could actually reach, given he barely tops your shoulder; yet another is vaguely amazed you're still coherent enough after that hit to _be_ vaguely amazed in the first place. Bezaliel fights like he's got something to prove: like he's a legend trapped in the body of something so much lesser and is _furious_ because of it.

Another kick, sudden as a viper, blurs in the trembling corner of your vision. You duck— straight into the path of his sword. It had been a feint all along. Your legs splinter the wood beneath you as you shove yourself into a hasty backflip, a few straggling strands of midnight hair charred to a crisp by the ambient heat of his Light. Bezaliel is already there by the time you land, as he _always fucking is_ , arcing into an overhead cut that takes both your arms to parry—spears crossed—and still drives you into the ground.

Or at least it _would have_ , if he hadn't dropped the sword halfway through it, let you block nothing at all, and then, with a gentleness bordering on arrogance, driven a pair of blazing stiletto daggers straight through the dark fabric of your shirt so their tips barely touched your skin. It's like you've been stung by a pair of ants, if those ants had dipped their pincers in lava, and it fucking _hurts_.

Not _quite_ as much as it humiliates, though.

"You need to stop fighting like you know how to," Bezaliel says. Young as he is—a mere eight hundred or so—his face is an open book to someone like you: unfortunately, that doesn't help when he's being nothing but brutally honest to begin with. He eyes you the way a lumberjack does a forest. How best do you need to be cut down to size? "You move like you think you have an idea of what I'm going to do next, and you fall apart when I don't do it."

He tosses the daggers away—they fizzle into sparks and nothingness as they fall—and steps back, narrow boots soundless on the oak beneath. His face is sharp the way knives are; it matches perfectly with the way he smiles, as violent as it is joyful. He's genuinely enjoying this.

"Don't predict. _React_. You're not good enough—not yet—to get it right as often as you need to. Watch my body, not my mind. You're a four-wing, now. That makes you as fast, if not faster, than most of the vermin out there. You can afford to hold off committing a little longer just to make sure you're not being tricked."

A bar of Light—like the core of a flame, blue-hot and burning—condenses into another claymore as tall as you are with a deep, resounding _thrum_ that you feel all the way to your bones, and settles into his hands. Six wings beat down as one; Bezaliel launches himself into the air, hanging three metres above the ground and a dozen more below the flat, tiled roof. Both they, and the walls as well, are covered in deep, black-charred cuts of the sort that come when a man wields a coronal mass ejection in the shape of a blade that _also_ happens to be longer than he is.

"Now, girl—try to keep up."

He spirals into a dive like an arrow tossed from a bow, straight at you. The wind he shoves aside strikes you well before he does, sending your hair into disarray and swirling sawdust into your eyes.

 _For fuck's sake_.

You dig your toes into the wood, legs exploding in violent thrusts to fling yourself out of the way as your will calls another set of spears into your hands with a sharp _crack_.

This is going to be a _long_ day.


	61. Entelechy 8-5

**I broke the middle finger on my right hand (my dominant one) a couple of weeks ago in a field hockey accident, and I still can't use said hand because of it. This update was powered mostly by spite at not being able to do anything as a result and the fact it doesn't matter if I only write at 50-150 words per hour if I can spend my time few other ways.**

* * *

A knock at the door.

This seems familiar. What does Ruri want this time? It's been a couple of days since you saw her last, apart from another short language lesson in a dining hall, and how long it takes for your lovers to come calling again is a point of professional pride—the later the better, because it means you managed to fuck their _hindbrain_ out. For her to return so early… well, maybe you should open the _second_ cabinet tonight.

Though, given your body feels like it was used to hammer down a particularly stubborn set of nails, maybe that'll have to wait. Fucking Bezaliel. Six hours being smacked around a room by an angry midget with a sword fetish is _not_ your idea of a good time. You swipe an arm like you're trying to pull down a blind, bringing up a projection of the other side of the door—thick, sturdy oak patterned with runic filigree—in a flurry of pink sparks.

Good thing you did, because that's definitely _not_ Ruri—it's Eldad, hair glistening in the torchlight like roses after rain. God damnit. You are way too exhausted for the conversation that's coming. Bastard probably knows it, too. He always seems to.

A flick of your wrist opens the door with a displeased—and entirely artificial—groan of the hinges anyway.

"Come in," you say, still stretched out on the pale sunlight sheets of your bed. You are entirely naked and strategically wet, having simply stripped out of your shorts, singlet, boots and spent the next half an hour in your bath the moment you got back from Bezaliel's latest bout of torture. Your hair even smells faintly of jasmine. Unfortunately, Eldad is not Ruri—what? Just because you weren't expecting her doesn't mean you're not _prepared_ —so the effect is entirely ruined. "What are you doing here?"

He smiles, stepping in as the door closes behind him. You'd have called it awkward on anyone else, but that's not Eldad's style. "If I said I simply came to visit, would you take me for a liar?"

You cock your head to the side in a spray of dark locks. "Yes."

A pause—you speak again just as he opens his mouth.

"You never do _anything_ simply if you can help it."

His laugh is like a mountain falling; yours is the ring of struck glass. The joke is an old one, but you have a feeling today will be all about old things, and you're too tired to keep running. Best to embrace it instead.

You sit up and curl your legs beneath you with a sinuous stretch of sleek skin—and a whisper of silk as you muss up the covers of your bed. Unlike the rest of you, they are perfectly dry. Of course they are; you wouldn't be much of a Fallen Angel without stain-resistant sheets. A snap of your fingers lights the torches in their brackets, bathing the room in pale, silvery light, like you've plucked down half a hundred moons and scattered them across the walls. Eldad's always preferred it when it's bright.

You think it reminds him of Heaven.

"Don't worry," you say, "I know the real reason you're gracing me with your presence. Hurry up—take a seat, would you? You _gave_ me the one you're looking at. Just use it. We've been past prevaricating politeness for a long time."

He crosses to the chair in question—all black leather and blacker iron—with strides that you can only describe as earth-shaking, and lowers himself into it. Most Fallen step as shadows, but not Eldad. In motion he is little less than geological inevitability. It makes his gentility, his _delicacy_ , all the more amusing. How does the man who looks as if he was cut from solid rock and gilded in steel serve tea the same way a geisha might train six lives to emulate?

"I think _you_ have been past 'prevaricating politeness' since Father made you," he says, an easy grin softening any suggested sting, "though I take the point."

You toss your head in miffed—well, not _disagreement_ , but… look, you don't have to explain yourself. "For that, you can fetch me a drink. There should be some gemheart whiskey in the back of the cabinet somewhere."

"No," Eldad replies, his eyes unwaveringly fixed on your face. "I will gladly share a bottle with you another day, Raynare. Not tonight. I would prefer to talk to you when you are sober, not trying to practice your rock-climbing skills on my abdominals because you mixed me up with a wall, for all that the mistake is strangely flattering."

"That was _one time_ ," you snap reflexively before you realise the rest of what he said, "and if I want to get drunk to make something easier, that's my prerogative."

"Yes, it is." He nods, as if to weigh down the point with truth. "But I would ask you not to, this time. Please."

You are quiet for a while. The silence is familiar. "Fine."

"Thank you."

He leans forward, metal creaking beneath his weight, and rests bare palms on bare knees—he's not wearing his cassock, instead dressed in a plain shirt and pants that almost blend into the chair. You're rather sure the absence is deliberate; it's welcome all the same. You'd rather be talking to your… you'd rather be talking to Eldad the man, not Eldad the priest.

"I would first like to apologise," he says as you blink in surprise. "I have not always treated you as I should. You are a—freer spirit than I have understood at times, and too often I have tried to place you in a box you never would have fit."

A 'free spirit' is probably the nicest way anyone's ever tried to describe your personality.

"You wanted me to help run your church." Your voice is level. " _Me._ And you couldn't understand that I had higher goals for my life. That I wasn't _satisfied_ with two shitty wings and half a sneeze of power. That I wanted as much to do with God as I do with a Satan's asshole."

Less, really. For everything else wrong with them—down to the very fact they exist—they _are_ very pretty.

"Yes." He smiles, a touch wry. "And I still do, for all that I know you never will. But I should not have kept chasing after you refused—and I _certainly_ should not have lashed out in anger at your own goals just because they stood in opposition to how I wished them to be."

"You were proven right, in the end." Every wall you can see—sandy stone, dull metal and duller granite, and bright tiles patterned with gold-edged lilies—is somehow far more interesting than his face. "Maybe you should have pushed harder."

You don't believe that. There are few things you would trade your new wings for, and almost all of them are just more of the same. But it seems like the thing to say.

"Being right does not _make_ it right, if you will excuse the wordplay." Though you are carefully studying the sheets on which you sit, you catch him shaking his head with all the ponderous grace of a glacier out of the corner of your vision. "No: it is a poor teacher who lays out his student's path rather than simply opens the way, and a worse one who belittles her for refusing it, no matter how accurately he may predict the result."

He gestures to you and the four pinions fluttering from the slimness of your back.

"Certainly I did not predict _this_ , so even that 'accurately' must be drawn into question."

You look up, hard amethyst meeting soft emerald. When you speak, it's slow, almost stuttery, like you've half forgotten how. "I don't think you should be apologising to _me_ , of all people, for selfishness."

At his surprise—well-hidden thought it may be—you smile, not sharp enough to be a smirk. You can't muster the arrogance to make it bladed. Not here. Not now. "I know what I am. I know what _we_ the Fallen are, and what you do your best never to be. In hindsight, it more surprises me that it took you so long to crack."

"Be as that may—"

"Look," you say, "this—this doesn't sit right with me. I won't apologise for wanting to live my life. You shouldn't apologise for wanting to live yours. It was a stupid argument anyway."

"I appreciate the sentiment, Raynare. Believe me, I do. But we cannot paper over six hundred years of discord by pretending there was no reason for it. I would rather we be estranged and working to fix it than close and lying to one another about how we were never not."

You huff, annoyed. Why must he always make things _hard?_ "Just watch me."

"I have," he says, "which is part of the problem. I gave up. You ran away. And so a rift that could have been sewn shut in a decade festered for centuries. That is what we Fallen do. We let things go, we do not _try_ , because it's easier that way. It is charred into our wings and seared into our soul. We sought something we desperately wanted once, however base, however banal—and we _burned_ for it. So we cower from the pain, as all things do, and refuse to seek it again.

"If something is difficult, we say we get bored. We say we have other priorities. We say we did not care as much as we thought we did. We say and we say and we say and we _lie_ , because our one moment of selfish bravery beat into us a cowardice that we can never master. And I say _enough_."

Eldad has thrust himself from his chair—he stands over you with his wings spread and his eyes ablaze. His shadow darkens the sunset of your carpet to something like blood.

"If I let us brush this over, Raynare, then I have learned nothing in all the days I have wondered how to be better than I am."

You stare up at him.

"I hated you." The sheets fist in your hands. You spit each word like they're the only things holding you steady—but you're falling faster and faster so you _speak_ faster and faster trying to outrun yourself because if you stop now you don't know if you'll ever start again. "Ruri asked me if I loved you and I told her love had nothing to do with it because I wasn't sure if it ever could again. I _looked up to you_. Even when I Fell and you had not. You were everything God should have been to me and then you were everything God _was_ to me and I _hated_ you."

He reels as if every sentence is a whip to scour his flesh.

You keep going.

"I don't, now. I haven't for a while. I was just… disappointed. I told myself that I shouldn't have been surprised. That nobody was ever as good as I thought they were. That of course I couldn't trust you—I couldn't trust anyone, so why would you be any different? You weren't Lord Azazel, who took me in when I was nothing, had nothing, and gave me all he didn't need to. You weren't Kalawarner, who had her chance to betray me and didn't take it. You were just someone I'd been foisted on by God who was finally looking for his side of the bargain and you didn't matter to me just like I didn't matter to you."

Your cheeks are hot. Wet.

You keep going.

"And I was _lying_ , because when I died I wished you were there. I wanted you to save me. You carried me through my own mistakes and you never made your own because you were _perfect_ and that made you everything I ever wanted to be. Then you weren't for one conversation and somehow I was _surprised_ , as if the fact you did something wrong was antithetical to the ground state of the universe."

You shake your head. Your chest feels damp.

You keep going.

"I was stupid and a fool."

"That makes two of us, then." Two hands drown your shoulders in their grip, and you find yourself pressed into soft cotton and hard muscle. Eldad smells like fresh grass beneath the bright sun. A scent and feeling both.

"I hope you're not trying to hug me," you mutter.

"Of course not." His voice is rough. "Just resting my arms."

"Okay." You close your eyes. "That's fine."

Eventually, he steps back.

Some time later, you speak.

"I haven't forgiven you," you say with a nonchalance a toddler would have faked better, "but if you stick around, you might be able to convince me to change my mind. It'll take a while—I'm pretty stubborn."

Eldad runs a hand across his face. His fingers glisten afterward.

"Yes," he says, "I know. Thankfully, so am I."

* * *

To fly is to be free.

You bob through the sky, coasting on crests of power. Your wings are—well, they're not really wings at all. Just well-folded edges of your soul, creased across the border between space and the spiritual. What they look like has little relation to what they _do_ ; it's psychosomatic at best, a thought given physical expression in a way easier to reconcile than some sprawling faux-geometric abomination or an infinite kaleidoscope of fire and Light.

But they do _matter_ , and you have twice as many as you were born with. They are an expression of your strength, a bleed-through of your excess—an excess you are yet to master handling. The currents of Light on which you once soared are now closer to raging streams, and you need to learn to navigate them when you never had to before; when you once just _knew_ in the same way you knew your name.

In the end, it comes down to—as most things seem to—practice. You are better today than you were yesterday; perhaps 'learn' was the wrong word, for it seems more like remembering. So thus you are here, in a room whose walls are so distant as to be almost invisible and whose roof is a living reflection of the Earth's, planes apart though the two may be. Sunlight flushes your skin from pale marble to smooth cream, and each time you flip yourself onto your back, inky feathers beating great, thumping gusts of wind, you can lose yourself in the oceanic emptiness between the clouds.

One day you'll learn the seals Azazel used to create such a miracle. One day.

You attempt a corkscrew and end up in a degenerate spiral instead—implying _anything_ you do isn't degenerate—with a wild rush of air blasting your hair in hazy disarray. The ground looms, a dark horizon of well-baked earth straight out of any misinterpretation of Hell. You wrench yourself up, organs rattling with the force, legs snapping forward and back hard enough to break them if you had been mortal. Okay. Definitely not quite there yet.

You are not the only one taking a chance to immerse yourself in this lying firmament, but it is vast enough that you never have to meet them if you so choose—and most of the others are alone besides. There are a couple of groups immersing themselves in _each other_ here and there, but you're a little too busy keeping yourself aloft with any semblance of elegance to properly enjoy the scenery.

Besides, you're waiting for someone.

Bezaliel climbs lazily to meet you, trenchcoat fluttering in the breeze of his passage. You're pretty sure it's enchanted somehow, because it's perfectly silent even though by all rights the metal-woven fabric should rustle with his every move. Whatever the metal—or the fabric—is you're not sure, except that it's a shade of black best described as 'edgy'. Or however the slang goes. His boots and gloves match, as usual, but at least this time his hands are empty—occasionally he attacks you the moment you arrive and just _doesn't stop_. Not that he ever really does.

"Nice crash," he says. "You really look like you're ready for this, girl."

"Oh, fuck off. I'm good enough."

"I doubt that. But we'll see."

He ignites a blade—half again as long and wide as you are—and threatens to cuts you in half with the same arcing sweep of his arm. You launch yourself up, over the hissing wedge of Light brighter than the heavens above, and actually go as high as you meant to. Praise be. It is the work of moments to craft two sunset spears, each crackling like a bonfire; it is the work of a lifetime to fend off Bezaliel's next three blows.

The first comes from below—apparently inertia is as foreign a concept to him as respect, because a twitch of his arms shifts his whole stroke from vertical to horizontal without the slightest effort or delay. Only a desperate slap with both spears, Light warring against Light with snake-like sibilance, is enough to deflect his strength; only through sheer stubborn _will_ do you keep the force from knocking you twenty metres to the side.

(In the end, it's only five).

The second is a brutal lunge at your back; somehow, in the time you were wrenching yourself to a halt, he's practically teleported—given how _stupidly fucking fast_ he's managed to move—behind you and… well, you supposed you can't really say he's trying to _stab_ you when his sword is large enough to incinerate your whole torso. You whirl to shove it aside with your spears crossed, the blade bearing down on you like a comet and roasting the bare skin exposed by your singlet and too-brief shorts—and stop, because the stab is so obvious that _what if he's planning something else?_

That hesitation saves you; Bezaliel's claymore blurs into a pair of battle-axes that you can't afford to block, the left swinging for your thigh and the right for your throat from the same direction. He's barely five feet tall and likely only outmasses you because of his trenchcoat, but where your punches might splinter stone to pieces, his will _crush it to powder_. You can barely stand up to him two arms to one—on even ground? Not a chance in Hell.

A furious flex of your wings whips you to the side. Had you the full measure of your control, you'd have gone over or even _between_ his axes, but for now this will have to do. A spear darts out to lick a line of fire across his wrist, between his glove and sleeve, but his spin _accelerates_ him past it—your Light glances off his armoured bicep with a piercing shriek instead, and suddenly there's another hideously huge sword ready to cut you into pieces by outright atomising you between the hip and neck.

There's no hidden trick here. No trap waiting to be sprung. Just you, Bezaliel, and his _stupid fucking claymore_. You get it. He's a six-wing. No need to keep beating you to death with overcompensation. It's not like he's going to lose out on kicking your ass by picking something smaller, rather than shoving a third of the sun into a single blade. And would it kill him to use it with two hands, too?

(Well, it would probably kill _you_ , so on second thoughts maybe you're fine with how things are).

You're a half-second too slow on the parry, spears not quite locked in place and arms not quite ready to take the hammering impact. It's like you've been struck by a boulder. Bezaliel _smashes_ you through the sky as if you weigh as much as dust, so hard that you actually crash to earth before the biting agony in your elbows and shoulders clears the dazed, almost drunken throbbing of your… well, everything else.

It takes a couple of seconds before you shove yourself out of the crater, and by the time you do, you are _fucking furious._

"What the hell was that, you asshole?"

You sway a little with each word, like you're still vibrating from the blow.

"Sorry," he says. _Liar_. You can see it in the curve of his mouth as he speaks. "I forgot myself—didn't expect you to see the axes coming. Good work."

"I'll show _you_ goo—"

The roof explodes.

The sky fizzles and dies, the room plunged into darkness lit only by what moonlight can sneak in through the hole. Thick chunks of rock—the smallest the size of you—thud into the brimstone around you, much like you did only moments before, throwing up clouds of choking dust. Bezaliel absently punches one into soot with a gleaming fist before it can crush him, black eyes fixed on something far above.

Through the air, a woman falls.

Her coat flaps, barely distinguishable from the night above. White hair—long, rough, and poorly hewn—hangs over her face, her body so tightly swaddled in cloth and leather it is barely distinguishable from a man's. Her left hand holds a sheathed sword—the scabbard is mostly a deep red, patterned with gilded vines, and the hilt appears bound with gold wire. All in all, it seems perfectly ordinary, save for the strange, flat cut-off of the tip of that same scabbard, as if the blade within does not taper to a point.

Her right hand is empty.

She lands without a sound, bobbing into a gentle curtsey—not that her leggings allow a perfect imitation, but points for style regardless.

"Hello," she says. "It's nice to finally meet you again, Grandfather."

"Sorry, kid," Bezaliel replies, "but I'm not even a father. Now who the Hell a—"

"I wasn't talking to _you_."

She lifts her head, shifting matted strands—like a mess of ugly cobwebs—out of her eyes, and pins you with her stare. The feather of her dented tricorn droops awkwardly. You smell blood and old bone.

It is at this moment you notice three things.

Her shadow is bubbling.

Her eyes are gold.

Her sword—when did she draw it _what the fuck_ —makes you wants to bow.

Oh _God_.

Sister Mercy, exiled Exorcist, nephilim, and necromancer, smiles.

It is a lovely smile.

Just as lovely as the parry—a piece of perfection you will never replicate in life—that catches Bezaliel's blazing claymore an inch before her waist. Sparks fly, bright blue flares against the darkness.

"That was rude." Her voice is honestly sweet, like the joy of a child, and so profoundly British your upper lip stiffens in solidarity.

He blurs, another five strikes searing violent afterimages around the two of them before the echoing, thunderclap clash of the first has died away. They fight like poetry in motion—all short, sharp stanzas and long, looping rhymes.

They don't even seem to be _trying_.


	62. Entelechy 8-6

Your thoughts are book-ended by blades.

Bezaliel is a storm in motion, the furious lightning of his swords a sharp counterpoint to the trembling thunder of his feet against the floor and his wings against the sky. He's pulled out a second, somewhere, somehow, and two claymores longer than he is melt the air, the earth, and even your clothes as they seek a monster's throat. Each is the blue of deep flame, and you can follow them only by the fading Light they leave behind. No wonder Kokabiel sent this man to train you—he might be the best swordsman you've ever seen.

Sister Mercy, then, is the best swordsman you've ever _heard of_. The steel in her hand is short, misshapen, the tip sheared away by some old accident; you can still see the crack, when you can see anything at all. Her right hand is loose by her side, only her left guiding the warding edge—but still Bezaliel never comes close. Maybe it's the pressure the unsheathed relic exerts on his mind (it weighs against yours like someone's wrapped a fist around your brain and started to squeeze), maybe it's her incredible strength and impossible speed, or maybe she's just that good. It doesn't really matter.

Their blades crash together like solar flares, all hissing sparks and furious heat. You have to back off another ten metres just to be safe. Every breath inhales charred earth, ozone, and beneath it all the bone-dirt stench of the grave. You hope it's not going to be yours. You'd much rather be cremated, if you had to die at all—at least Gremory did _something_ right. Sort of.

Anyway. That's not the point: the point is that Bezaliel can't touch Sister Mercy, can't even look like he's going to, and you briefly, firmly regret your choice not to get him help. Most of the other Fallen took one glance at the conflict and ran (metaphorically speaking). A sensible decision, really. You're not sure why you haven't joined them; there's a difference between cowardice and pragmatism. Sister Mercy is no Dulio, no Vasco Strada—but that's like saying Kokabiel is no Azazel. The gulf between her legend and theirs is much closer than the gulf between her legend and _yours_.

It takes three seconds for the first teleportation circles to crackle to life around the room; not for those who flee, but those who come to fight. This is the heart of the Grigori's power, and it has been fighting a war in some form since Azazel first formed it. An invasion, one woman or otherwise, is unwelcome but not unexpected. It will be cast aside, dashed against the might of the Fallen's only standing army—technically it's not called an army, in the same way the Japanese don't have one either—and your day will return to normal.

Light blasts you off your feet. You barely catch yourself in the air, black hair spilling wildly across your eyes and cheeks as all four of your wings struggle to keep you upright lest you crash unceremoniously to the floor below. Somewhere, you hear a bone-shaking thud and a curse from Bezaliel—blinking away afterimages, you see a perfectly circular crater around Sister Mercy, and your erstwhile instructor shoving himself to his feet well over a hundred metres away.

A spear screams into his hand with a screech like a chainsaw against glass, and he hurls it at her like a comet.

Too late.

"I am the crowner of kings," Sister Mercy chants, each syllable the rolling chime of church bells, "and my touch confers their kingdom!"

She slams her not-sword point-first into the ground, and it _ripples_ from the impact, a groaning wave of soil and stone like the surface of a lake just after it's been struck by a boulder. The teleportation circles—every shade of the rainbow and more besides, some beyond the range of human sight, and all crackling with power—are snuffed out as flame before a monsoon. The world feels heavier. Every breath is a struggle, as if the air has been replaced with iron and lead. It is hot and heavy on your tongue.

Almost absently, a spear of her own obliterates Bezaliel's inches from her face and is obliterated in turn, a cataclysmic denotation that rocks you to your soul. Trickling photons rain from the collision, twinkling gold mixed with electric blue.

Nephilim.

 _Right._

"What do you _want_?" you ask despite yourself—despite every instinct urging you to flee as a shadow before the sun.

Three more spears soar toward her, and Bezaliel is there almost before they arrive, swords swooping in from an angle that forces Sister Mercy to choose between blocking them or him. His armour, once pristine black, is scuffed with dust and scorch marks, and his close-cropped ocean hair has been burnt entirely away—including his eyebrows, which is hilarious even given the circumstances—but his face is set like the edge of a blade.

Her sword, which you are slowly coming to realise is not really a sword at all, crashes against both of Bezaliel's own with a shockwave that ripples the feather of her tricorn and sends cobweb locks into disarray; her free hand traces a cross behind her, punctuated with a spoken word that cracks out like a hammer against the ribcage of the world. One of the seventy-two Names of God. A blazing barrier, wide as she is tall and silver as the Moon, shudders with the impact of each one of Bezaliel's spears—but it holds.

"I came to rescue you, Grandfather!" she says brightly, blade sweeping out in a flurry of strokes that—what the fuck she _traced out a spell circle_ with the blunt tip at the same time as she sought to cut Bezaliel's head from his shoulders. A blast of concussive force booms out like cannonshot, smashing him away like the fist of God Himself.

Then she turns to you.

Her face is still stained with soot, and her clothes—she wears what might be a nun's habit, if a nun was expecting to don plate armour at any moment—are rough and rumpled. But her eyes, cut into her aristocratic face like tiny stars, fix you where you stand. With that not-sword in her hand, her shadow boiling behind her, reaching around her toward you with grasping fingers that she slaps aside absently like a mother cuffing a disobedient child… Sister Mercy has a palpable _majesty_ to her, a presence larger than the world that seeks to constrain it. She looms as a throne does.

You hate it.

You hate _her_.

There's a spear in your hand, chittering madly. It won't help but you don't care.

She opens her mouth to speak and—

"You ruined my orgasm, you bitch!"

A hail of sunflower Light shatters the rocks she's standing on, and she's lost beneath the deluge. Above, in the sky, Abimael—slender, with hair even whiter than her skin—scowls, her body as naked as her rage, four wings slashing in irritation. She must have been one of those you saw enjoying themselves in the distant corners of this cavernous room, you can smell it from here—it seems her paramour has abandoned her in the face of Sister Mercy.

"That'll teach her," Abimael says, with the same sort of smugness that saw you dismiss Hyoudou as naught but a child. "I was _so close_."

"My apologies and sympathy both," Sister Mercy replies, predictably entirely unharmed as the smoke clears. Not even the feather she wears is any more ruffled than it was when she arrived. "I should have waited, I was just so eag—"

She spins, blade knocking a Light-forged chain aside as she steps past the other end. Bezaliel's arms are blurs, and you see the burning whip he lashes out at her with not as any single object but a solid screen of afterimages.

"—would you _stop that?_ We are trying to have a _conversation_."

He ignores her. Every clash of not-sword against chain is the hiss of freshly-forged steel being dunked in water; the acrid tang of burning metal chokes your throat.

"How unfortunate," she adds. "I'm terribly sorry, Grandfather, but it seems I will have to deal with this first."

"You keep calling me that," you say as Abimael glances at you. "Why?"

You haven't been totally idle, watching the fight. You've been thinking. If you're not going to run or contribute by force of arms, you can at least try and keep her off-balance. Keep her distracted. You've always been better at talking—well, running your mouth, but that's close enough, right?—than most other things, you just needed to know where to begin.

In the end, figuring that out was easy: like any good lawyer, you're going to start with the questions you already know the answers to.

A necklace shimmers to rest across her chest—a compass, bronze and electrum, each cardinal point set with precious stones. Light pulses across your skin, strong enough to drown out even the raging firestorm that is her fight with Bezaliel. _Sacred Gear_. Not one you've seen before, but one you've heard of: Holy See, the miracle of omniscience. Yes, you too would like to slap whoever named it for their horrible taste in puns.

It's not quite as absurd as it sounds—less all-knowing than all-hinting—but still as potent as you would expect from one of God's own gifts.

"Every day," she says, punctuating each syllable with arcing cuts that drive Bezaliel back, over and over, "I have asked when I would meet God. When I could gaze on the face of the Lord Himself and marvel at His glory. Again and again I have been told no. Never. Not in this life or the next. It drove me quite mad."

Abimael has apparently lost interest in the conversation—sparing you a disdainful glance, though you can't imagine why, she hurls herself into the fight, two snow-white spears of Light humming in her hands. She's perhaps a metre away from plunging both into her target's unprotected back when Sister Mercy's own shadow rears up, a grotesque, gaping maw of void-black teeth serrated like notched bone, and bites off her hands. Star-bright blood sprays everywhere, eating into the earth where it lands, and her spears fizzle out.

Her scream is cut brutally short when the woman spins and stabs her in the throat. The end of whatever holy relic masquerading as a sword Sister Mercy is using is blunt, but there's a terrifying simplicity to the brute strength behind it—it crushes Abimael's windpipe with a wet sound and rocks her head back so violently you're pretty sure it snapped her neck. She hits the floor with the dull slap of falling meat.

"Then, not so long ago, I asked as usual—except this time, the answer was Japan. So I set my course, had a few amusing encounters with old friends and new enemies along the way, only to arrive, ask again that very evening, and be told the Underworld instead. But I persevered, and now I am here!"

Abimael's wings collapse into sparks of yellow Light. You can still taste her blood on your tongue from where one stray drop landed on your lips—like sunlit fields and old wood.

You lift your eyes from her body. In death, the flare of her hip and smooth stretch of her back no longer hold your interest as they did in life.

(There is, of course, no other reason that you would choose to turn your gaze from her freshly-made corpse).

"That's a how," you note a little distantly, "not a why."

A searing chain morphs into a battleaxe just as Sister Mercy's blade rises to meet it, smashing through her intentionally loose deflection and biting deep into the dark, consecrated leather protecting her shoulder.

"Fucking hell, girl, shut up and _help!_ " Bezaliel snaps, harsh and sharp as his follow-up lunge with an arming dagger toward the rent in the holy fabric. He opens his mouth again, but whatever he was about to say is driven out alongside the air in his gut when a padded knee slams into his torso. He folds around the blow, gasping, only a hasty beat of his wings tossing him out of the way of a stroke that threatens to split him head to groin.

 _I'm_ trying _you moron_ , you think but do not say. A meat-head like him wouldn't understand what you're trying to accomplish.

"Please do not disrespect the Lord in my presence," Sister Mercy says, and slices the back of her palm on the edge of her not-sword, "for I am His mercy—His boundless generosity that subjugates all wrath!"

She flicks her wrist, scattering her blood—the red of dying suns—across the smoking earth in a crude approximation of a formal ritual circle. You know what she carries now, though—a sword that crowns kings and speaks of mercy? Curtana, the Blade of Mercy, once the blade of Tristan, and the original of which the current English Crown Jewel is naught but a stilted copy. Moonlight refracts off steel as she points it as Bezaliel like a conductor's baton.

Chains of gold bright as daylight erupt from the space inside the ring she crafted with the rasping slither of metal on metal—he cuts three from the air with blinding streaks of sky-blue starfire before the fourth wraps around his wrist, so tight you hear his bones creak. The limb freezes, pinned in space and time. Bezaliel curses so fervently flame sparks from his lips, but just before his other claymore is about to slice apart the shackle, another pins _that_ arm too. After that, less than a second passes before he's trussed up in a way you'd find uncomfortable even in the bedroom.

A spear of Light, fierce enough that your skin starts to peel, punches through his heart before you can say a wor—no. It doesn't. At the last moment, he wrenches his chest to the side. The chains give only slightly, regardless of the desperate fury of his strength. It's enough. The smoke of sublimated flesh wafts across your nose, and you cough in instinctive disgust, but the wound is in his shoulder. He's not dead yet.

Now's your chance. "If you're trying to have a conversation with me, have you considered _not_ killing my brothers and sisters? It's not really a behaviour I'm fond of."

Strictly speaking, there are plenty of them you'd be glad if she _did_ kill, but your Kokabiel-given teacher isn't on that list. Though you will admit a small satisfaction to seeing him be the one smacked around for a change.

Sister Mercy stabs Curtana into the ground—Bezaliel bound, muzzled, bleeding and most importantly _still alive_ —claps her hands together in brief prayer, and dusts off her cloth-padded breeches.

"As you wish, Grandfather. Forgive my rudeness; I was distracted."

The room shakes. Out of the corner of your eye, you see half a teleport circle flicker to life before collapsing into glittering motes. Sister Mercy frowns—it's an expression her face, exquisite as polished ivory even beneath the grime of battle, seems ill-suited for.

"Ah, we should hurry." She extends her right hand toward you, her left still holding Curtana. Despite everything, it's utterly pristine, marred not by heat or ichor. If not for the shattered tip, it would be as perfect a blade as you have ever seen since Heaven.

"Hurry _where_ , exactly?" Your voice is shrill with—not fear, never fear, just exasperation.

"Heaven, of course. God cannot reign in Hell. Ah, no, a thousand apologies for my blasphemy—theologically God reigns everywhere, but you understand my meaning."

"I don't know if you've noticed," you say, flaring all four of your wings—their inky feathers in a state best described as disgruntled—for emphasis, "but I'm not actually God."

 _If I was, you never would have made it to the floor._

"Yes you are," she replies, matter-of-fact, "you just haven't realised it yet."

"Having an unshaped Sacred Gear," it's not that, but information is a weapon, "in my soul and doing a bad impression of Jesus does not God make."

It'd have been a much better allusion if you'd taken three days to reincarnate, rather than one.

"Of course not," Sister Mercy agrees, and it throws you off-balance enough to blink in surprise, "but they _can_."

She smiles. It is as sweet and lovely as a breeze in summer.

Her gaze, deep with a dark, hungry fanaticism you last saw in the Crusades, is less terrifying than that smile.

"Come with me, Grandfather. Let us reclaim the throne of Heaven."

She extends a hand, palm up.


	63. Entelechy 8-7

Sister Mercy stands before you, a supplicant swaddled in bloodstains and shadow, asking you the one question you have always wanted to hear.

And you are tempted.

 _Oh_ , how you are tempted.

Long have you thought that God denied you the fullness of your glory. Long have you blamed Him for what He had not made of you. Long have you hated the hierarchy of Heaven. To upend it all, to scatter it to chaos and laugh from the throne above… you have had dreams that ended like this. That _began_ like this. Power to reshape the world, a name— _the_ name—known in its every corner, and the adoring love of billions of its unwashed masses: yes, there is little else that could appeal to you more.

You have always wanted to be great.

 _Allāhu akbar._

The words settle into your mind like a stone, shattering the pool of your thoughts.

Because that is the problem. You would not be God because you were mighty. You would be mighty because you were God. A name to shame the stars, but not _your_ name—not even the one He gave you, let alone the one you took for yourself. There was no God before God, but there would be a God before you.

And His shadow is long enough that you fear to drown in it.

It is a weak fear. A child's fear. The same one that trembles your voice whenever you argue with Eldad. You feel it regardless. No man is an island, but you are no man at all—you have always sought to stand on your own, to let your soul scream _I AM_ to the skies for all to hear. How could you turn your back on that, on your Fall, on everything you have made of yourself since?

Your whole life has always been centered on who. Who you are, who you wish to be, who you want, who you want to want you, who you love, who you hate, who, who, _who_.

Why, then, should you ever care about the what?

You do not need to be God.

You need to be _you_.

(And besides, just imagine all the work you'd have to do as the lord and master of Heaven! You used to be an Angel. You know how it is. Being a worse God than God would be as a burning coal in your stomach, and you could not bear it—but to be better, you would not even have time to kiss Ruri once a month, let alone pursue any other you'd like to take as a lover.

It would be torturous).

You look again at Sister Mercy's smile, that slash of sharp white teeth.

It no longer seems so terrifying.

"A pretty offer," you say, "but no."

She blinks, eclipsing her sun-gold gaze, and you notice only now that she never has before. Her eyes are bright—the same way a moth's wings might be. _Don't eat me, I'm poison_. "No?"

You shake your head, pushing her hand back down to her side. Sister Mercy's skin is rough and cold to the touch, like you've shoved your fingers into the winter earth.

"Even if I could become God, which I doubt," you say, mindful of Bezaliel's nearby ears—you hope she doesn't decide to kill him now that you've refused her, "I would not. I am no-one else, I _will be_ no-one else, but me. Let me die Fallen or not at all. Anything else would be an insult."

Perhaps you were a little heavy-handed with the propaganda, but it'll make for a better tale in the telling.

Assuming a tale will survive to be told, that is.

(Well, you suppose it will either way—you'd just like to survive with it. And Bezaliel too, you guess).

"Huh," she says, a strangely human mannerism, "I should have expected monotheism to follow the monomyth."

You blink.

What?

The room shudders again. Bricks so large you couldn't reach around them with your wings break from the roof in cataclysmic eruptions of powder and crash to the earth like meteors, each impact so loud it rattles your organs and jars your teeth. You nearly bite your tongue by accident. Framed against the false moon, you think you can see motion—dark specks against darker skies. Curtana's blade, gold-etched steel, is shaking even though Sister Mercy's arm is perfectly still.

Your confusion doesn't show on your face, but she glances at your shadow, cocks her head to the side as if listening—the fingers of her free hand playing with the bejeweled compass around her neck—and speaks.

"You misunderstand, Grandfather. You do not have a _choice_ ," that sounds like a threat, and your toes flex in the soil, "about what you are. What you, in some ways, must have always been. The throne of God lies empty, but that is not how Creation works. There is always a God. There _must always be_ a God."

She sounds just like Eldad, when he tried to explain to you, once, why God had to exist. The argument is as sound now as it was then—which is why you're mostly focusing on how the air is starting to hum, a low keening just above the edge of hearing that builds like the moments between lightning and thunder. Unfamiliar Light brushes against your soul as an old friend freshly found; awkward, hesitant, wondering how much in the common the two of you still share.

 _I am here_ , you think. _You know me_.

The Light winks out. The humming stops.

Curtana's shaking has so intensified you cannot tell which moment in space and time the blade actually occupies. Sister Mercy's lips, small and pert, purse into a frown as her long hair—even paler than her skin—is whipped into a frenzy.

"Ah," she says, vaguely annoyed—her accent makes it sound like a queen discussing some unruly peasant rebellion with a favoured courtier. It matches the aristocratic cut of her face. "It seems we are out of time for today. Very well!"

Sister Mercy steps closer, and you are one startled moment from launching yourself backward when she tilts her head up, just slightly, to look you directly in the eye. You've seen that look before, on misguided lovers and idiotic priests. On mothers before their children and madmen before their murders. _You are the reason I am_ , it says, _and all my reason is for you_.

You did not flinch at her smile.

You flinch now.

"I won't force you to come, Grandfather." She shakes her head. "I don't need to. You _will_ come, eventually."

She taps the Sacred Gear resting over her heart.

"You, yourself, have foreseen it."

Sister Mercy bows her head, as if in prayer.

"Until we meet again. Amen."

An explosion.

It scatters your senses to the four winds—obliterates your sight and deafens your hearing, kisses your skin and tongue and nose with fire until all you feel and taste and smell is smoke and scorched earth. You've been on the wrong end of a grenade before, but there was nothing mechanically ugly about this. No powder, no shrapnel.

Just Light.

(You wonder, briefly, if this is how that inugami felt as you cracked open your soul and screamed the agony to his face).

You blink until you can see again.

The first thing you notice are your wings and arms, crossed reflexively in front of your body—the perfect ivory of your flesh is instead red and peeling, and your feathers are, well, moulting would be the polite word for it. An apprehensive glance down reveals what holds for your arms holds for 'every exposed inch of your body', which happens to be most of it after the spar and the blowback from Sister Mercy's fight with Bezaliel; your wings, which are only partly physical to begin with, are on the verge of falling apart, so you don't want to imagine what your _hair_ is like. You might as well have just stepped out of that ill-fated meeting with Ammiel.

A flake of skin drifts past your nose from somewhere on your forehead.

God _damnit_.

The world is still terribly silent, which is why you don't notice Bezaliel limping toward you until he pokes you on the shoulder to get your attention. The hole in _his_ shoulder is a raw and angry burn—unlike the rest of his wounds, it weeps not golden blood but something halfway between milk and clear water. You imagine the stench would be nauseating if you could smell anything but fire.

You read his blackened lips to figure out what he's saying, but you only get as far as "go" before— _Light_.

There is a screech like rubber on asphalt as whatever barrier Sister Mercy used Curtana to cast shatters and two dozen teleportation circles disgorge two dozen Fallen each. At their head is Kokabiel himself, clad in red plate and mail like the hide of some mighty, bloodstained beast. It's the same colour as his eyes. The unshackled fury of his soul sweeps across the cavern as scouring sand, piling higher and higher until the room—a full kilometre in diameter—feels barely large enough to fit just the two of you. You know you should smell the actinic discharge of so much magic in one place, but where you were once inhaling flame all you taste now is the queer, cold emptiness of the pitiless night. It stares you down with a thousand twinkling eyes. You feel dizzy.

In Kokabiel's right gauntlet he holds less a spear of Light than a core of a star. You can't even see it directly—it's too bright. You only know it exists the same way mortals know the sun.

The armour is new—the last time you saw Kokabiel dressed for war, it was in black, all cruel lines and savage spikes—but it's a bit hard to remark on his fashion choices when his strength threatens to stop your heart in your chest and you can barely look at him for longer than half a second without feeling like your eyeballs are going to melt into your skull. For all you know, the armour might not even _be_ new; the spear might just be so intense that the metal is glowing from the heat, as if it was just plucked from a forge.

"Raynare!" He sounds happy, which is so dichotomous with what you know of him that it takes a second to recognise it; a second _after_ the second it takes to recognise that you can hear at all. "Good—you're safe."

Behind him, his soldiers array themselves, unwavering sentinels armoured in celestial bronze and star-iron. Bezaliel, struggling to stand as he is, marches toward them with the dignity of those wounded in the line of duty—it's almost like he means to take his place among them. Kokabiel stops him with a glance, taking in the ruins of his tunic and chaps, his one missing boot, the nicks and cuts and scrapes all over his compact body and the gaping hole in his collarbone.

"You may report back later, Bezaliel," Kokabiel says. "Lissandra, take him to the healers."

One silhouette identical to the rest steps out, and takes Bezaliel gently by the arm. They vanish in the snap-hiss of a short-range teleport.

(No Fallen Angel can heal themselves or others, outside of their natural regeneration, but a mind like Azazel's and several thousand years to work with has thought up _some_ solutions to the issue, however time-sensitive those solutions may be).

Then Kokabiel turns to you—or, perhaps, beyond you, where the corpse of Abimael lies. He bows his head, angular face as sombre as an executioner's axe. "The good Sister killed Abimael, I see. She will regret that."

It is less a statement of intent than fact.

You feel an urge to laugh and have no idea why.

"What happened here, Raynare?" he asks. "Tell me everything."

You do.

Bezaliel was there. He'll tell Kokabiel all he heard regardless, so you can conceal nothing. And why would you? You have done nothing wrong—wrong _happened to you_. Besides, Kokabiel already thinks the world of you; any madwoman speculating that you are inevitably destined to become the next God he will likely treat as just more evidence of how truly special you are.

Sooner than expected, you finish. In the end, there wasn't really that much to say. You were sparring, you were attacked, there was a conversation, Sister Mercy disappeared. Done.

Kokabiel contemplates your report for a few moments, while you do your best to look anywhere but him. The cataclysmic radiance of his spear is too much for your eyes to bear—even staring at the ground before him makes them blink and water. Turning to study the artificially perfect moon instead seems to help; the light reflected off the scales of his armour is as a sunset, bleeding red across your wings and back.

"I suspect she has fled," he says. "A wise decision, but not wise enough."

Kokabiel slams his spear into the ground. Where it should incinerate, instead it trembles as if struck by an earthquake, a clap of thunder against your ears. It matches the majesty of his voice.

"With me. We will hunt her. I know how these fanatics work—she cannot not be far."

You're actually partway through launching yourself into the air when he holds up a hand. "Not you, Raynare. You are injured, in need of healing, and this is no business of yours besides."

You clench your teeth on any attempt to tell him she was after _you_ so _of course_ it's your fucking business—for one, favoured or not it's a suicidal idea to back-talk Kokabiel, and for two you don't actually _want_ to chase Sister Mercy.

Instead, you bow your head in obeisance. "Yes, my lord."

"Stay safe."

Hundreds of wings beat as one, every individual whisper combining into a roar that blasts the earth into disarray—you have to scatter the storm of soil and dust with a muttered word and a shield of wind before it can get into your eyes.

You sigh.

A soft pulse of Light repairs your clothes and drives any remaining debris from your skin. The far exit, no longer sealed by Curtana's edict, beckons. You step toward it, mind adrift. You feel heavier, somehow, weighed down by exhaustion—your Light came a little slower than you might have liked in the casting. Guess you really _do_ need some healing.

Thing is, you don't want to deal with Bezaliel right now, and you sure as Hell don't want Azazel to see you looking like, well, a sauteed chicken. A flambéd crow. An _al dente_ raven. You're neither a chef nor an ornithologist, though, so you're pretty sure you misused all of those terms and you can't think up any more relevant birds—the self-flagellation will have to wait for another day.

Just like visiting the healing rooms.

Your injuries, however embarrassing, aren't particularly _major_ , and you're honestly better off relaxing in your room while you wait for your natural perfection to restore itself. Not, of course, that you aren't perfect even now. You're just… _differently_ perfect. Yeah. That sounds about right.

You layer a fragile illusion over yourself, just enough to convince anyone who isn't looking too closely that no, there's nothing wrong with you: all four of your wings are folded against your back as a sea of black knives, your hair is still pulled into a pair of ponytails to keep it out of the way during training, and your surprisingly chaste sea-green short shorts and low-cut singlet—fine, they're surprisingly chaste _for you_ —are both in mint condition.

(No pun intended).

That done, you make your weary way through marble halls and steel corridors and Escherian staircases to return to your room. The door doesn't open the first time you brush your Light against it, which is irritating, but none of the alarms triggered so you don't think anyone's trapped it—a second brush when you're actually concentrating works as intended, and you make a note to fiddle with the sealing matrices later. Heaven forbid the day you're so drunk you can't even get inside or something.

The door slams behind you with the thud of wood on stone; you run a hand down your side to tear off your illusions with a sharp, broken-glass shatter and collapse onto your extravagantly large bed. Today, your covers are pure, virginal white—such a backward phrase, as if even virgins these days are anything approaching pure—for irony's sake and deliciously comfortable. You strip your clothes off before flopping your head back onto a pillow. The silk is pleasantly cool on your bare chest and legs, and your every breath is stained with jasmine and spice. Whoever invented scented sheets deserves a night with you between them.

The thought makes you laugh, just a little.

What a fucking day.

It began with Eldad—you snap your fingers to light the torches on the walls before you realise what you've done—and so many years of accumulated truth left unsaid. Then you went to spar with Bezaliel, ended up face-to-face with the most terrifying Exorcist, rogue or otherwise, this side of Vasco Strada, and found out you may or may not be God's… what? Phylactery? Hell if you know.

Hell if you're even certain you believe her, Sacred Gear or not.

You wouldn't put it past the old bastard—He even fucking named you _Jehiel_ , like that's subtle. But maybe it was just arrogance, an assumption that He'd live as long as all His children. It's not like you've ever understood the mind of God, just lived beneath its petty cruelties.

Like father, like daughter, really.

You sigh, air tickling the back of your throat and hissing through your teeth. Your flesh itches, shedding old, dead skin, thin and see-through like gossamer; there are slight, stabbing pains throughout your wings as new feathers slowly spill out of your soul and thrust to the surface. You're probably going to be here a while.

A carefully-muttered spell and a delicate, if sluggish, twist of Light calls a bottle of lacasa to your hand. Inside the glass, it gleams, a sort of yellow that looks a little like it was made with honey and a lot like it was made with the bees that _made_ that honey. You tilt your head back at an angle that would break a human's spine, now-unbound hair spilling across your back, and let the drink fill your mouth to brimming before you swallow—lacasa tastes like sugar and lightning, and if you drink enough of it in one go it makes you wonderfully numb.

(If it wasn't clear by now, you are a firm believer that any problem that can't be (put off) solved with enough alcohol is a problem that just hasn't encountered the right amount of alcohol yet).

You're somewhere on your fourth bottle and the last, dangling shreds of your coherency when a flickering circle red as flame appears above your pillow. It takes you a long moment to realise there's a illusion of Kokabiel studying you from within it, and it's just as you hastily finish lifting yourself to attention that you realise you are still, indeed, utterly naked.

Worse, you're utterly naked and _not flawless_.

Is this your new purpose in life? Flashing every single leader of the Grigori on complete accident?

The whole time, Kokabiel's gaze never shifts from your eyes, and you're not sober enough to be able to tell if you're only imagining the faintly amused cast of his features. Now that you can actually see him properly, you notice his hair—the same shade as your own, a black so dark it's less a colour than a feeling—has been cut short, finishing just past his ears. Given he's worn the same style longer than _you_ have, that piques your curiosity something mighty, but the day you have a casual enough relationship with Kokabiel to ask him about his hair is the day you've achieved your every possible dream.

In other words, not anytime in the next few hundred years.

"Raynare," he says, "I should like to speak to you about today. And another day, not so long ago, in Tokyo. I think we have—much, to discuss. Meet me in my office in two hours."

The illusion winks out.

Thank God for that. You're not sure how much longer you could have kept a straight face, whether over the insult that was Kokabiel not even being distracted by your breasts or _the fact Kokabiel could see your breasts in the first place_.

Perhaps a minute later, when you have reluctantly stoppered and returned the last, half-finished bottle of lacasa to your drinks cabinet, a second circle shatters the stillness. This one is somewhere between the green of open fields and the iridescent white of liquid moonlight, and you recognise it just in time to hastily pull the shadow of a dress over your body.

Azazel—in Light, not in flesh, though there's not _that_ much of a topological difference—appears the moment you're finished. You suppress the urge to fidget; you're not sure if your disguise will actually hold up under movement. You're sort of trying not even to breathe, just in case. He studies you with wine-red eyes, and breaks out into a dazzling smile.

You do your best to avoid blushing.

(It doesn't really work).

"Raynare!" he says. Each syllable is quick, almost harried. "I just finished sorting out some pressing business, and it's finally cleared up my schedule enough that I can invite you to my labs for something long overdue: studying your soul. I need an hour—actually, let's say two, this is important—to prepare but then we can get right into it!"

You open your mouth only to be drowned out by a distant explosion.

Azazel frowns, running a hand through his caramel-and-chocolate hair. "I knew I shouldn't have left that running in the background. I'll see you soon!"

He's already turning away when the circle collapses into sparkles and fades away.

Well, fuck.

What do you do now?


End file.
